Reflections of South African student leaders - towards a long history to the #FeesMustFall campaign

Early announcement - soon to be published:

Reflections of South African Student Leaders

1994-2017 

This exciting collection brings together the reflections of thirteen former SRC leaders from across the landscape of South African universities. Each student leader’s reflections are presented in a dedicated chapter that draws closely on an interview conducted in the course of 2018/19 as well as an interactive process of editing, correcting, and approving the chapter between the researchers and the student leaders. 

Among the purposes of the research and book is to provide a longitudinal, a historical, perspective to #RhodesMustFall, the #FeesMustFall campaign, the #EndOutsourcing campaigns and so forth which continues to change South African higher education profoundly.

Each former student leader was asked a set of questions:

• What is your personal background and context of getting involved in student leadership at university level?
• What is your personal background and context of getting involved in student leadership at university level?
• What were the most important contextual issues defining your time in student leadership?
• How did you see your role in the SRC and the role of the SRC in the university?
• What kind of support did you receive from your institution during your term of office?
• What is your view of the student governance model, the electoral system, and the involvement of political parties in the SRC as prescribed by your university?
• How did you relate to the student body during your term in office?
• How did you participate in university governance (‘co-operative governance’)?
• What were the main challenges that needed to be dealt with during your time in leadership?
•  How did you as student leader deal with these various challenges?
• To what extent was the student voice heard?
•  How do you explain the continued use of student protests in a context of formal student representation in governance structures?
• How do you understand the emergence of the 2015/16 student movement, including #RhodesMustFall, #OpenStellenbosch, and #FeesMustFall, its way of operating (including social media etc.), and its achievements?
• What lessons have you learnt in student leadership?
•  What would you change regarding student governance?
• What has been the impact of your participation in student leadership on your political attitudes and ideology, your participation in politics, your career, and your personal life?
• What were the most important contextual issues defining your time in student leadership?
• How did you see your role in the SRC and the role of the SRC in the university?
• What kind of support did you receive from your institution during your term of office?
• What is your view of the student governance model, the electoral system, and the involvement of political parties in the SRC as prescribed by your university?
• How did you relate to the student body during your term in office?
• How did you participate in university governance (‘co-operative governance’)?
• What were the main challenges that needed to be dealt with during your time in leadership?
•  How did you as student leader deal with these various challenges?
• To what extent was the student voice heard?
•  How do you explain the continued use of student protests in a context of formal student representation in governance structures?
• How do you understand the emergence of the 2015/16 student movement, including the #RhodesMustFall, #OpenStellenbosch, and #FeesMustFall campaigns (amongst others), its way of operating (including social media etc.), and its achievements?
• What lessons have you learnt in student leadership?
• What would you change regarding student governance?
• What has been the impact of your participation in student leadership on your political attitudes and ideology, your participation in politics, your career, and your personal life?

In addition to presenting the student leaders’ answers to these questions in a variety of ways, the book includes an introduction as well as cross-analysis conclusion chapter. 

For the Council on Higher Education, this book represents its second successful publication from its leadership reflections project (which also included a colloquium on student governance in 2019). The first book was published in 2016 as Reflections of South African University Leaders, 1981-2014.

For the Human Sciences Research Council, the research for this book is part of its project on the historical dimension of the new South African student movement “From #RhodesMustFall to #FeesMustFall”, funded by the Andrew Mellon Foundation.

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