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So as we wrap up this course, I want to leave you with a few key messages about student-staff partnerships and a little encouragement to help you take that next step. First of all, partnerships is a process, it’s about staff and students working meaningfully together to shape higher education practise, and the benefits are huge. Students gain confidence and skills, educators gain fresh insight and collaboration, and institutions build a culture of innovation and inclusion.
Secondly, partnerships can happen in many, many different ways, in all kinds of spaces within the university, from classrooms, to committees, to research projects, to student services. And that’s why partnership programmes really do matter, because they help universities take a coordinated approach across departments, services, and faculties. And over time, they embed partnership into the fabric of an institution, because partnership is not just a one-off, single intervention, it’s a culture that shapes how we teach, learn, and lead in higher education.
Thank you for participating in this course. If you’d like to learn any more about how we do partnerships at Southampton Solent University, then we’d absolutely love to hear from you. But we also value the opportunity to exchange insights and learn from other institutions engaged in student-staff partnership work.
- Partnerships is a process of staff and students working meaningful together to shape higher education practice. The approach has many benefits for students, educators, and the wider institution.
- Partnerships can happen in a multitude of ways and in varied spaces. Partnership programmes help universities take a coordinated approach to partnership working across services/ departments/ faculties. Over time, partnership can become embedded in the culture of the institution.
Sharing Partnership Practice
At Southampton Solent University, we recognise the benefit of sharing with, and learning from, other institutions working with their Students as Partners. We work in collaboration with our Student Partners to share our experiences with the sector via presentations and publications. Our expertise and interests are as follows:
- Organising cross-institutional partnership programmes
- Fostering inclusivity in partnership projects
- Student-staff partnership in university third spaces
- Scaling up co-creation work
- The real-world outcomes of partnership work
- Evaluating partnership practice
For further information about the Solent Student Partner Programme, please contact the Lead: Dr Karen Arm ([email protected]). We are especially interested in sharing good practice for student-staff partnership working with other higher education providers.
Thank you for taking this ‘Developing a Student Partner Programme at Your Institution’ course which has been developed with Karen Arm and Student Partners. We hope you have enjoyed it. Remember to mark all the lesson as ‘Mark Complete’ to earn your Course Completion Badge.
Below you will find some practical guides on student-staff partnerships
- University of Cambridge (2020) Working with Students as Partners Guidance and Resources
- Healey, R. (2023) A guide to working with students as partners. Centre of Academic Innovation and Development, University of Chester
- QAA (2025) UK Quality Code for Higher Education: Advice and Guidance – Sector Agreed Principle 2 – Engaging Students As Partners
- QAA (2024) Preparing for student-staff partnerships – a toolkit for staff
- Mercer-Mapstone, L. and Marie, J. (2019) Practical Guide: Scaling up student-staff partnership in higher education. Institute for Academic Development: University of Edinburgh
- SPARQS (2025) Student Partnerships in Quality Scotland
- UCL (2023) Creating inclusive student-staff partnerships – toolkit. Teaching Toolkits, UCL Arena Centre
For a collection of case studies of partnership practices around the world and in different kinds of institutions and across a range of disciplines, see:
- Healey, M. (2019) Students as partners and change agents in learning and teaching in higher education
References:
- AdvanceHE (2024) Essential Frameworks for Enhancing Student Success: Student Engagement through Partnership, AdvanceHE.
- Arm, K., Akello, Z., Kumar, A. and Wilding, A. (2025) The Living CV: Translating partnership experience into real world employability outcomes for students, Journal of Educational Innovation, Partnership and Change, 11(1).
- Arm, K. (2025) Partnership at Play: Empowering student partners to navigate third space, Journal for Learning Development in Higher Education, (33).
- Arm, K. (2024) Staff -Student Co-Creation in a Matrix Environment. In Jamil, M G., O’Connor, C., and Shelton F.(eds.) Co-creation for academic enhancement in higher education: Research-informed case studies, Palgrave Macmillan. 47-66.
- Arm, K. (2023) ‘Enhancing digital inclusivity: Powerful partnership with students’ in S. Abegglen, S., Burns, T., & Sinfield, S. (Ed.) (2023) Collaboration in Higher Education: A new ecology of practice, Bloomsbury Academic, pp.154-159.
- Arm, K. (2023) Student Inclusive Curriculum Consultants - A partnership project, Teaching Insights, Edition 3 - Closing Award Gaps: Celebrating Success.
- Bovill, C. (2019) A co-creation of learning and teaching typology: What kind of co-creation are you planning or doing? International Journal for Students as Partners, 3(2), 91-98.
- Cook-Sather, A., Bovill, C., and Felten, P. (2014) Engaging Students as Partners in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education: A Guide for Faculty. Jossey-Bass.
- Healey, R. (2023) A guide to working with students as partners, Centre for Academic Innovation and Development, University of Chester.
- Mercer-Mapstone, L., Dvorakova, S. L., Matthews, K. E., Abbot, S., Cheng, B., Felten, P. and Swaim, K. (2017) A Systematic Literature Review of Students as Partners in Higher Education. International Journal for Students as Partners, 1(1), 15–37.
- Peart, D., Rumbold, P. and Fukar, E. (2023) Student Engagement Through Partnership: A Literature Review, Northumbria University.
- QAA (2025) UK Quality Code for Higher Education: Advice and Guidance – Sector Agreed Principle 2 – Engaging Students As Partners, Quality Assurance Agency.
- Varwell, S. (2021). Models for exploring partnership: Introducing sparqs’ student partnership staircase as a reflective tool for staff and students. International Journal for Students as Partners, 5(1), 107-123
Discussions
What one thing will you do differently because of participating in this course?
Please share your thoughts and questions in the comments section below.