MORE THAN JUST A PLACE AT THE TABLE – STUDENTS DESERVE REAL AUTHORITY IN DECISION MAKING PROCESS

As colleges across the country navigate budget shortfalls, funding uncertainty, program cuts and growing institutional pressures, students are being asked to adapt alongside them. Conversations about the future of education are happening everywhere — but too often, the people most affected by those decisions remain excluded from meaningfully shaping them.

This is not a statement against MHCC in particular as MHCC has historically been ahead of the curve when it comes to creating opportunities for student power in the decision making process. This is a nationwide area of concern that can always benefit from further evaluation.

Student voices are often praised, showcased and occasionally invited into the room. But when it comes to actual decision-making in education, those same voices are too often sidelined — heard but not counted. If schools are truly designed to serve students, then students should have formal authority in shaping how those institutions operate.

Right now, student involvement is largely symbolic. Student committees and representatives, surveys, listening sessions and public forums can create the appearance of inclusion without guaranteeing meaningful participation in the decision-making process. Students can speak, but they cannot vote. They can suggest, but they cannot decide. That gap matters. Without real authority and accountability attached to student input, participation becomes performative rather than collaborative: acknowledged, then quietly ignored.

This is not just a philosophical concern; it is a practical one.

Students experience educational systems every day and in real time. They understand how policies affect classrooms, campus culture, mental health, accessibility, affordability and student life long before those effects show up in institutional reports. Excluding students from governance conversations doesn’t just silence concerns — it removes some of the most immediate and informed perspectives available.

At the same time, schools consistently emphasize the importance of civic engagement, leadership, collaboration and critical thinking. Students are taught to advocate for themselves and others, participate in democracy, engage with their communities and think independently. Yet within many educational institutions, students are often denied the very same mechanisms of participation they’ve been taught to value. Students learn to question the system but remain functionally powerless to shape or improve it.

The message from these institutions is clear: Student voices matter — just not here. It is a contradiction that is damaging to the entire ecosystem.

Many of the skills institutions claim to value most — communication, ethical leadership, adaptability, collaboration, creativity and civic responsibility — are also the hardest to quantify. They are developed through participation and lived experience, and they are most visible when students are trusted as active contributors within their communities rather than passive recipients of information.

This doesn’t mean educators, administrators or governing boards should be removed from decision-making processes. Educational institutions require expertise, structure and accountability. Shared governance is not weakened by student participation; it is strengthened by it. Models already exist in schools and colleges across the country where student voices hold formal weight through voting rights, student advisory councils and participatory leadership structures. These approaches recognize that students are not separate from institutional life — they are central to it.

Students are already navigating complex systems while balancing academics, employment, caregiving responsibilities, financial pressures and uncertainty about the future. Concerns about experience or preparedness often overlook that reality. If leadership readiness is truly the concern, then the solution is not exclusion — it’s mentorship, transparency, support and meaningful authority.

Ultimately, the question is simple: Should the people most affected by educational decisions have a meaningful role in shaping them?

If the answer is yes, then student participation cannot remain symbolic. It must be treated as a fundamental part of education itself — built into institutional culture through trust, accountability and meaningful authority.

Listening to students is a start, but meaningful participation only exists when those voices carry real influence within the systems they are expected to navigate.