Being a ‘model’ student: the impact of affective influences on full-time undergraduate student behaviours and practices in the current Higher Education context in England
This research explores how full-time undergraduate students’ (FTUG) behaviours can be theorised in terms of the State’s biopolitical influence and distribution of power amongst constantly evolving actors within English Higher Education. Findings demonstrate how this framing enables a timely and nuanced perspective on the ways such influences shape the ‘model’ student and their negotiation of networks of power. Prior research investigated ‘becoming’ a student and student transitions (Nielsen, 2015), education’s changing governance (Ball, 2007; 2013; 2017) and shifts in Higher Education’s perceived and espoused purposes (Furlong, 2014; Choat, 2017; Wahlstrom & Sundberg, 2017). However, little prior work identifies the State’s shaping of FTUG behaviours, particularly in a post-COVID-19 context where student belonging, attendance and engagement are problematic. The research addresses these influences in a series of delimited settings by considering the discursive spaces of marketing, regulatory and other documentation that frame the student experience, and a selection of social learning space (SLS) that students inhabit. Digital spaces are outside the research scope. This research is multi-method and based on affect theory (Foucault, 1978; Anderson, 2011). Thematic analysis of a documentary corpus of illustrative materials enables an exploration of student discursive spaces. Individual and group interviews with key actors investigate shaping the ‘model’ student’s experience. Structured observations of students identify their engagement with SLS. The research elucidates universities’ role in the State’s scripting of ‘model’ student behaviour. Contrastingly, the findings illuminate how students retain agency amidst the exercise of biopolitical tactics and hegemonic power and offer policymakers and universities a perspective to re-evaluate and critique the current scripting of ‘model’ student identity. The research models a reimagined network of power, tying together the perspectives and power-flows between student, university and State, thus enabling new conceptions within which they might be rebalanced, for example in the use of SLS and setting student expectations.
Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations