Student Representation in University Governance: Factors of Involvement

Abstract

The article focuses on student representation as an aspect of university management underinvestigated in Russia but important in the world context. Based on previous studies on students representation and analyzing a dataset on elections of student representation bodies in the Higher School of Economics (Moscow) in 2019, the author highlights three groups of factors that determine participation intensity. The general factors include education level, financial, academic, and social success, and the number of groupmates-candidates. Next, most active representation participants are also characterized by male gender, state education financing, metropolitan origin, interaction with university faculty members, and positive perception of competition in elections. At last, less active participants are characterized by female gender, commercial financing of education, regional origin, diversified information consumption, and negative perception of high competition in elections. Based on the study results, the author provides recommendations for the university educational policy — to reduce internal inequalities and cleavages in both social and informational aspects.

Acknowledgments. The author expresses gratitude to the Degree Programmes Department, the Center for Institutional Research, and the Election Commission of the Student Government of the HSE University for the opportunity to work with the data which formed the basis of the study.