Student representative assignment
During the assignment
The person who leads the work of a body needs to ensure that everyone is heard and has the opportunity to contribute. Remember to make room for the students' voices, without the situation becoming accusatory or discriminatory. Ideally talk about what you do and why during the meeting and in the communication that takes place between meetings in which the student representative plays a part.
If there are matters in which student representatives should not participate, it may be appropriate to divide the meeting into two separate parts.
It may be useful to check the details with the student representatives after the meeting. Does anything need to be explained or changed before the next meeting?
Swedish or English?
The official language of the University as a public authority is Swedish, therefore meeting documents and meetings are usually in Swedish. A challenge for non-Swedish-speaking student representatives can therefore be linguistic.
One way of handling meetings where participants speak different languages is for certain items or parts of the meetings to be conducted in English. The notice to attend can be in English even if the documents and minutes are in Swedish. Extensive documentation can have a summary in English. Uppsala University's language policy provides some guidance for situations in which several languages need to be handled simultaneously.
Uppsala University’s language policy
Taking decisions
Student representation will take different forms depending on whether decisions are taken by one or more people. There are also situations in which it is not appropriate for student representatives to participate.
Access to premises
Student representatives may need access to premises for their own meetings connected to student influence. Student associations have the right to use teaching premises for gatherings arranged by assocations for their members.
Guidelines for granting access to and use of Uppsala University premises (in Swedish)
At the end of the assignment
The student representative's assignment is time-limited. The chair of the body can, upon request, produce a certificate for the student representative detailing completed assignments. The students’ unions issue a general certificate to the student representatives.
Problems that arise
Pay attention to signals that something is not working well and contact the relevant student representatives or students’ unions at an early stage to investigate what can be done.
Complaints are managed and resolved locally in the first instance, where the problem arose. In cases where the problems cannot be resolved locally, there are functions beyond the department that can be of assistance. There are various functions at the students’ unions, such as student and doctoral student ombudsmen, student liaison officers and student safety representatives.