Committees and representatives

Students sit on committees at all levels of the institution, shaping education policy and contributing to decision-making.

At a local level, Student Academic Representatives Co-Chair Staff-Student Consultative Committees (SSCCs) and sit on Departmental and Faculty Teaching Committees.

At an institutional level, students are members of a number of committees including:

• Professional Services Committees
• Education Committee
• Student Experience Committee
• Academic Board.

How you can support students in these roles

To enable students to contribute to committees in meaningful ways, it’s vital that they have the opportunity to learn about the context of the meeting and the purpose. A pre-meeting to discuss the Terms of Reference can be a useful starting point.

Incorporating an overview of the function of departmental committees into a training session for Lead Department Representatives, in Term 1 can also help set a collaborative tone and make meetings, such as SSCC, as effective and action-focused as possible.

Resources for staff

• Student Academic Representation Resources for Staff by the Students’ Union UCL
• Making students feel their voices are being heard: changing staff-student committee meetings (case study)