Practice

We aim to foster a thriving Community of Practice that supports, enables and champions staff members to make students as partners practices “business as usual”. No matter your experience engaging with students as partners practices, it always important to reflect on key guiding principles that should underpin all SaP work. The following five guiding principles have been co-designed with students and staff to ensure the students’ voice is at the core of everything we do.

Five Guiding Principles

Add value for students

Students as Partners activities should aim to improve the student experience and recognise the complexity of the student context and intersections of lived experiences.

Acknowledge different perspectives and expertise

What makes partnership projects unique is that student expertise (i.e., what it’s like to be a Deakin student) is acknowledged, embraced and at the core of our practice.

Be respectful and inclusive

Staff and students must be respectful, creating a safe, supportive environment that is both inclusive and representative of the Deakin community.

Be flexible

Students, just like staff, are often very busy, so keep the modes of engagement and the project flexible is key.

Evaluate and optimise

In all of our projects, it’s important to continuously evaluate our work and optimise for the future. Ask student partners what could have been better and/or think about connecting your work to scholarly research.