A student council for the development of teaching: the Studierendenrat at Leuphana University Lüneburg
Modelled on citizens' assemblies, a student council of 23 randomly selected students deliberated on the Transformation module and issued shared recommendations for its development.
The practice
With the introduction of the restructured Transformation module in the Leuphana Semester, Leuphana University Lüneburg piloted a new format for involving students in the development of teaching: a student council (Studierendenrat) modelled on the principle of citizens’ assemblies. For the pilot in 2025/26, 23 students were selected by lot under diversity criteria (faculty, semester, gender) so as to represent the student body in miniature. Across five professionally moderated and scientifically accompanied sessions, participants deliberated on the module’s content, structure, and teaching and assessment formats, and condensed their perspectives into a set of shared recommendations, published as a student report (Studierendengutachten). Participants were compensated for their engagement, the process was funded through study-quality funds, and the module team committed to responding transparently to each recommendation at the start of the following academic year (Leuphana University Lüneburg, 2026).
The landscape pressures it speaks to
The council responds to skepticism about the relevance of higher education ( ⇓ ) by treating student perspectives as a design factor in the development of teaching, and to the crisis of democratic culture ( ⇓ ) by letting students experience deliberation, consensus-building and institutional responsiveness first-hand; its diversity-sensitive selection also addresses the concern that participation formats reach only the already privileged ( ⇓ ). The crack in the regime practice ( ◊ ) it exposes is the standard evaluation regime: questionnaire-based course evaluations with fluctuating, self-selected participation, little exchange among students, and feedback that rarely reaches those responsible for programme development in a form they can act on.
From niche to regime
Anchoring ( ⇑ ): The College leadership intends to continue the council as a standing element of quality development for College-taught modules; stable funding lines and a defined place in quality-assurance procedures would consolidate this.
Translation ( ⇑ ): Casting the outcome as a ‘Gutachten’ with a documented institutional response translates student deliberation into a genre that governance actors can process.
Diffusion ( ⇑ ): The format lends itself to transfer to other large modules and programmes, accompanied by research on its effects on participation quality and teaching development.
References:
Leuphana University Lüneburg (2026). InnoTransform – Studierendengutachten: Empfehlungen zur Weiterentwicklung des Transformationsmoduls. Lüneburg. See also the Student Council page on this site.
