Assessing the Conditions for Student Voice

By Dr. Michael Fielding, University of Sussex

Originally published in FORUM; included with permission from author.

Speaking

• Who is allowed to speak?

• To whom are they allowed to speak?

• What are they allowed to speak about?

• What language is encouraged / allowed?

• Who decides the answer to these questions?

• How are those decisions made?

• How, when, where, to whom and how often are those decisions communicated?

Listening

• Who is listening?

• Why are they listening?

• How are they listening?

Skills

• Are the skills of dialogue encouraged and supported through training or other appropriate means?

• Are those skills understood, developed and practised within the context of democratic values and dispositions?

• Are those skills themselves transformed by those values and dispositions?

Attitudes & Dispositions

• How do those involved regard each other?

• To what degree are the principle of equal value and the dispositions of care felt reciprocally and demonstrated through the reality of daily encounter?

Systems

• How often does dialogue and encounter in which student voice is centrally important occur?

• Who decides?

• How do the systems enshrining the value and necessity of student voice mesh with or relate to other organisational arrangements (particularly those involving adults)?

Organisational Culture

• Do the cultural norms and values of the school proclaim the centrality of student voice within the context of education as a shared responsibility and shared achievement?

• Do the practices, traditions and routine daily encounters demonstrate values supportive of student voice?

Spaces

• Where are the public spaces (physical and metaphorical) in which these encounters might take place?

• Who controls them?

• What values shape their being and their use?

Action

• What action is taken?

• Who feels responsible?

• What happens if aspirations and good intentions are not realised?

The Future

• Do we need new structures?

• Do we need new ways of relating to each other?

* Forum, Vol. 43, No. 2, Summer, 2001.

TOOLS

Tools for Student Voice Assessment, Evaluation, and Research

SoundOut provides programs in this area. Learn more.