Students as informal leaders in deliberate acts of inclusion

Abstract

This article focuses on the importance of highlighting students’ role as informal leaders and their efforts to take on active roles in decision-making processes. Students’ involvement in such roles entails an imperative process for the development of school inclusion. Contemporary literature has repeatedly focused on the multiple roles student voices play in, and the ways they impact on, the processes of school change and improvement. However, the ways in which students themselves interpret their roles as informal leaders, through the initiatives they take on, have not been explored, especially in environments characterised by cultural pluralism. Our research examines the ways in which thirty-six students from four Greek secondary schools with a highly-diverse cultural profile undertake deliberate acts to develop into equal co-producers of a new pedagogical decision-making agenda reinforcing inclusion. The results of our research bear multiple implications for both the levels of educational policy and school practices. © 2022 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.