'I wish to participate but...' : investigating students' perceptions of student-staff pedagogical partnerships at a Hong Kong University

• Published in: Higher education Vol. 87; no. 3; pp. 779 - 793
• Main Authors: Dai, Kun, Matthews, Kelly E., Liang, Yifei
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.03.2024; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Anglophones; Capitalism; Chinese culture; Chinese students; College students; Customers; Education; Graduate students; Higher Education; Interviews; Learner Engagement; Learning environment; Neoliberalism; Partnerships; Partnerships in education; Pedagogy; Positioning; Student attitudes; Student perceptions; Student teacher relationship; Students as partners (SaP); Teachers; Teaching; Teaching Methods; Teaching process; Team teaching; University students; Western civilisation; Hong Kong; China; Hong Kong China; Hong Kong University; Pedagogical partnerships; Student-staff relationships; Students as partners; Student perception
• ISSN: 0018-1560; 1573-174X
• DOI: 10.1007/s10734-023-01035-7

There is an increasing focus on relationship-rich education and relational pedagogies in higher education. Engaging students as partners (SaP) to nurture values-based pedagogical relationships is one such approach, yet it is contested with limited research outside of Anglophone countries. To advance a collective understanding of SaP as a global practice, we interviewed 35 postgraduate students at a research-intensive university in Hong Kong with a hybridised educational setting combining Chinese and westernised strategies and heritages. Reflecting on their learner-teacher relationships as both undergraduate and postgraduate students, they discussed differing senses of student identity that shaped how they perceived their pedagogical relationships: entanglement of positioning themselves as followers, customers, and co-teachers. The influence of neoliberalism, capitalism, and marketisation of higher education in the Hong Kong context was evident throughout the interviews. We discuss the implications for learner-teacher relationships as a pedagogical partnership in the broader hybridised higher education context of Hong Kong. In doing so, we argue that students are navigating an in-betweenness that shapes how they see themselves and the pedagogical relationships they form with teaching staff. [Author abstract]