Adult-Driven Student Voice happens when adults motivate, inspire, inform, encapsulate, and generally make student voice become convenient for adults. This article identifies who, what, when, where and why it happens.
Here are five characteristics of adult-driven student voice.
- WHO: Students who adults want to hear from are selected to share their voices.All students are equal members of the schools they attend, both in a literal and metaphorical sense. However, adult-driven student voice selects specific students who may not jostle adults’ opinions or ideas to share student voice.
- WHAT: Students say what adults want. They usually echoing or parroting adult beliefs, ideas, knowledge, and/or experience. If they share their own, adults largely agree with what students have said.
- WHEN: The calendar is determined by adults for students.Students are listened to when adults have the interest or ability to hear them, and not necessarily when students want to be heard.
- WHERE: Student voice happens in places adults want it to be shared. Whether on a graffiti wall in a forgotten alley downtown, in a boxing gym for teenagers, in debate class, or at a city-run forum for students to share their opinions about something, student voice happens where adults approve of.
- WHY: Adults solicit student voice about specific issues. Students have a variety of perspectives about all kinds of subjects. However, adult-driven youth voice allows only perspectives on issues that are important to adults or that adults pick for students. If students move outside adult-driven boundaries, they are either re-directed or expected to stop sharing their voices.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each of the above characteristics. Think about what matters and whether it matters in Meaningful Student Involvement.
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