Student Co-Researchers: How Principals Can Recruit, Train, and Enlist the Help of Students to Examine What Works and Does Not Work in Their Schools

Abstract

This article describes an effort by principals and university researchers to create student co-research groups at several high schools. The authors describe the student co-research team concept, how it provides principals with ways to actively engage students in ongoing schoolreform efforts, and how it assists them in gathering and analyzing data regarding school change. More specifically, the article describes an effort to create student co-research groups across school sites to address dilemmas districtwide and within specific schools. Co-research team enactment, training, and support are discussed and suggestions for principals to sustain such a concept are recommended.

Student Action Research: Reaping the Benefits for Students and School Leaders

“…The student coresearchers design and conduct their own study and then present the research findings to various audiences, such as school administrators, faculty, parents, and other students at the school. In this work, students are actively engaged in school reform endeavors, and their research supports the efforts of adults to continuously improve the school and classrooms (Yonezawa & Jones, 2007a).…”

Measuring Mechanisms of Student Voice: Development and Validation of Student Leadership Capacity Building Scales

“…Finally, students should be formally recognized for their contributions to the school, ideally in the form of wages (Mitra, 2007) or academic credit (e.g., B. H. J. Brown, 2010;Chopra, 2014), but giving food, community service credit, or public praise to students are possible alternatives (Yonezawa & Jones, 2007). A lack of recognition and compensation can impede student voice initiatives (Pautsch, 2010).…”

“…• • Research to inform decision making, often through participatory action research (e.g., Osberg et al, 2006;Yonezawa & Jones, 2007). • • Relationship building between youth and adults (e.g., B. H. J.…”

“…Brown, 2010;Møller, 2006). • • Consistency or regularly holding meetings at the same time and location (e.g., Chopra, 2014;Yonezawa & Jones, 2007). • • Governance structure or a school's formal system of decision making and students' roles in it (e.g., Brasof, 2014, Pautsch, 2010).…”

Student Voices: Generating Reform From the Inside Out

“…Collectively, the student teams conducted 82 teacher interviews and 117 classroom observations across eight sites. In previous articles, we laid out the teams' training and work, and discussed our dissatisfaction with the adultled nature of them (Yonezawa & Jones, 2008a, 2008b. We reported that although the initial student co-researchers teams helped complete the Carnegie evaluation, it did not further a youth voice agenda.…”