Student partnerships can leave dissent unheard

Updated Sep 12, 2026

Ask student partners what happens when they disagree. Lutendo Nendauni’s study in Studies in Higher Education examines partnership within a South African university where participants described toxic leadership. For those of us interpreting student feedback, it prompts a practical question: how do students’ contributions affect decisions?

What the study examined

Nendauni used semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis with 10 students and 10 academics, purposively selected at one university. The research explored how partnerships operated within unequal institutional relationships. It offers situated accounts, rather than a measure of partnership effectiveness across universities.

For UK teams, we suggest using it to review the path from a student concern to a decision. Our introduction to student voice in higher education sets out different ways students can contribute. Choose the route according to the question and the influence available to participants.

Key findings

An invitation did not guarantee influence. Students described entering governance spaces while their challenges were dismissed. Some co-design experiences nevertheless gave them a sense that their ideas mattered.

Access could depend on alignment with leadership. Student accounts included selective support for projects. Partnership sometimes opened opportunities, but could also reproduce favouritism.

Repeated dismissal could discourage speaking up. Students described exhaustion and withdrawal alongside experiences of feeling heard in partnership spaces. Positive participation and wider institutional harm could coexist.

Partnership remained fragile. The author argues for resourcing and shared authority, while cautioning that partnerships alone cannot eliminate toxic leadership. This is an interpretation of qualitative evidence, not a tested institutional remedy.

Put disagreement into the feedback review

The following are our proposed applications for UK Student Experience and insights teams. They should be evaluated locally.

Start with a recent decision and trace the student contributions behind it. Record the concern, who considered it, the response and the explanation given to students. Include suggestions that were declined and questions still unresolved. This gives the team a concrete record of how input was handled, rather than relying on attendance as evidence of influence.

When reviewing open comments, distinguish criticism of a decision from criticism of how the student was treated. For example, disappointment with a timetable and an account of being dismissed after raising an accessibility concern call for different enquiries. These are illustrative scenarios, not examples from the paper. Keep the original context available to authorised reviewers so that a broad label such as dissatisfaction does not become the whole explanation.

Invite students to challenge the interpretation as well as the proposed response. Ask whether a summary preserves their concern and whether important disagreements have disappeared. Our briefing on trust, expectations and power in student partnerships offers a related UK research perspective. The immediate purpose is to identify what needs correcting or further discussion.

FAQ

Q: How can we review whether students feel able to disagree?

A: Ask about a specific occasion when they challenged a proposal: what they raised, what happened next and what remains unresolved. Offer an appropriate route outside the partnership meeting and explain who will see the response. Use the student comment analysis governance checklist to plan access and reporting before sharing sensitive accounts.

Q: What limits the transfer of this study to UK universities?

A: It concerns one South African institution, shaped by its particular history and governance. Students were interview participants, but were not co-researchers in analysis or manuscript preparation. Use the findings to develop local questions, without assuming the same experiences or causes elsewhere.

Q: What does this mean for wider student voice analysis?

A: We recommend keeping evidence of participation, reported experience and influence separate in institutional reporting. A comment can prompt investigation; its absence cannot establish that students felt able to raise the issue. Use analysis to prepare a discussion, then document what further evidence and action are needed.

References

[Paper Source]: Lutendo Nendauni "Student-staff partnerships as counterforces to toxic leadership in higher education: insights from a South African university" DOI: 10.1080/03075079.2026.2650625