A chapter by London Met’s Digby Warren and Wilko Luebsen in new Student Engagement handbook explores the benefits and challenges of student partnership schemes.
Date: 19 February 2020
London Met’s Digby Warren and Wilko Luebsen have contributed a chapter to a vital new book, A Handbook for Student Engagement in Higher Education: Theory into Practice.
Edited by Tom Lowe and Yassein El Hakim, the handbook draws on scholarship and established practice to unpack the concept of student engagement. It provides ideas and examples alongside compelling theory, and research-based evidence to offer a thorough and innovative exploration of how students and staff can work together to transform the higher education learning experience.
Warren and Luebsen’s chapter, Students as Partners and Peer Coaches in Student Engagement, explores how London Met’s Peer-Assisted Student Success (PASS) scheme, which offers course-embedded and individual support, can foster benefits for the peer mentors, called “Success Coaches, besides those they assist.
As their chapter highlights: “Their stories illustrate why they became agents, their contributions to student engagement and the benefits they have gained. Inspired by their own experiences as first-years to become helpers who could empower others by sharing what they have learnt, they also provide a feedback loop between students and lecturers, while helping to create a friendly and engaging environment.
“Many Success Coaches become involved in other ways too, as representatives, ambassadors, trainers or in student societies. Their histories testify to increased self-confidence and understanding of their subject, and development of transferable skills - thanks to the opportunities afforded by their role, from the perspective of self-determination theory, to experience aspects of autonomy, relatedness and competence - while facilitating first-years’ engagement and development.”
A Handbook for Student Engagement in Higher Education is published by Taylor & Francis.
