In conversation with Matt Oakley
Student Partner Interns at The University of Manchester
Matt is the Teaching and Learning Coordinator in the Directorate for Student Experience at The University of Manchester, where he also graduated with a BA (Hons) degree in Theological Studies in Philosophy and Ethics. He also worked as a Peer-Assisted Study Session (PASS) leader and coordinator during his time as a student.
In this post for Partnerships in the Spotlight, we discuss how Matt became involved in the Student Partner Intern programme at The University of Manchester, and his hopes for the future of student-staff partnerships and their impact across higher education.
Can you describe your work, and how you became involved in student-staff partnerships?
When I was a student I wouldn’t have said I was the model student but the thing that really got me interested in a broader scope was being a PASS leader. So, attending PASS, being a PASS leader in my second year at university, and a coordinator in my third year. I started off working in partnership with other students to deliver sessions. Then, as a coordinator, I started working with the staff coordinator to design the sessions throughout the year for the PASS leaders. This led me to a graduate internship at the university. They do a graduate internship scheme across loads of different places but the one that I heard that was particularly good was the Peer Support Graduate Intern scheme. You are part of a team of four looking after a load of the schemes and elements of portfolio work.
At that point, one of the earlier student partnership projects we did brought two students to work with us to improve our basic life support scheme which is all about getting students to the basic level of knowledge if someone collapsed on the road, they would have the confidence to do something. That went really well. That was my first exposure to student-staff partnership and I was just bowled over by how good, and how willing students are. They were paid but still giving up their time and really going above and beyond in the stuff they were doing, and their output was incredibly impressive in terms of session plans, resources, and ideas for the future — they came up with a brand new logo. When you’re here, you see the atmosphere and how ambitious everybody seems to be on campus, and how helpful students are.
Six months or so later we were setting up the student partner programme. The Teaching and Learning Vice President, was of the opinion that students should be paid for their time, if they are going to partner up with projects. That led to the creation of a Student Partner Programme. I was incredibly interested in continuing to work with students and seeing what we could bring. So, a natural progression into it and great to see things more formalised and a little bit more embedded within the institution.
How many years has the student partner internship at the university been running?
Almost a year. Last February is when it first began and we first brought on students in May. It’s very much in its infancy but there’s definitely been other work going on across the university with student partnership.
We have seen students organising under Covid-19 advocating for their higher education and its quality. Do you feel many students are aware of partnership working as a way for their voices and needs to be integrated?
I would think not. I think there is some incredible stuff that students get involved in. I think it works both ways. Staff aren’t quite aware of how willing students are to get involved in working with the institution, and I think that this perception that comes across as a negative, that they’re complaining, makes staff reluctant to reach across the picket lines, as it were, and bring them on board and see what ideas they have. I’m sure that for many students… you come to the university, do your course and you don’t really have any understanding of the context around, or any impact that you can potentially have on your course.
There are student reps, which is one of the ways I hope students know they’re partnering up with the university to share views. But on this real base level, working together with staff to define a project, come on board, work, and change things, I don’t think students are particularly aware, and it’s definitely something we want to make people aware of. Things like John Owen’s project that’s been going on working with students as partners for years on course content — holding them up as exemplars and trying to expand that out as much as we can.
So, I think there’s little awareness of it right now but I’d hope that this changes because the impact with these projects is immense. I think the students are the experts within higher education. They know what they want and they know what’s good. So continuing on that path would be best I think!
Do you see a growth in this approach coming via top-down, senior university level, or bottom-up from students themselves? Why?
I think it’s been top-down so far. So the initiatives from the top from saying this is the way it wants to go. They’ve all been very supportive of student partnership and pushing this idea, which hasn’t been as well documented or as well wanted as it is right now. There’s a great need for it that’s recognized. It’s something that’s been brewing for a while.
I think it’s top-down now but top-down can only go so far. I think the demand then needs to go bottom-up and that’s where we’re going to start talking to these existing partnership networks: we’ve got student reps, we’ve got peer support, we’ve got these other student partners who are now working on projects who are hopefully voices that can be magnified among the student body. We want to try and promote student voices as much as possible.
I think you want that student demand for, “I want to work with the university and this is how I’m going to do it” — and a clearly defined path to do that. I think bottom-up is the way we want it in the future.
Perhaps it can offer another channel… I know you’ve mentioned student reps. So, if this can be seen by students as another channel for them?
Exactly. You don’t want to diminish the existing partnership activity at the university because there is a lot but we just want to be able to empower people and work even more closely with the university on projects.
As a philosophy graduate, are there any unique insights you think are important to recognize about partnership?
In philosophy, I was focused on the big questions which are integral to almost everything in life. The big one I can think of that’s linked to partnership is stuff not happening in isolation. People aren’t left in the dark — they’re not starting from step 0. We’re already a couple of steps up on the ladder and so can help people advance it even further.
What has been your best experience so far, and what are your best hopes for the future of student-staff partnerships and their impact across higher education?
It’s been tough. It’s been a weird time to start a job like this for student partners. My favourite part is just talking to student partner interns, being able to hear their ideas. I think you plan all this stuff and think, “it’s going to be great but wow I am getting sick of planning this stuff”. Then you come into sessions and talk to students, particularly in the difficult circumstances they’re operating in this year, to see the output of some of the projects has been fantastic.
There have been three student partner interns who have applied for the Fellowship of Higher Education Academy who went to the panel last week and I can’t yet reveal the results other than to say they were very positive! It’s so incredible to see students be rewarded for the work they put in. I’m very lucky to work with students who just go above and beyond.
The future hopes are for everything to begin with a discussion like this. At least start with students in some shape or form on every kind of big project that’s going to define things across the university. You’d hope that further down the line course content is not created in a vacuum of staff and lecturers. It’s got to be in partnership with students at the university and I think Covid’s really highlighted that with this quick switch to online learning that’s happened. We know that staff have also been informed about this at the last minute, to switch everything online, but just thinking how much better that process would have been if students had been involved from the outset. So, the future hope is every kind of project has students involved in some kind of shape or form.
Further information on the Student Partner Programme can be found on their website -
A big thank you to Matt for taking part in the Partnerships in the Spotlight series.
