Wanzare Ogolla Zachariah Sika Ouma James

Abstract

This study investigated the extent of student participation management on institutional governance in public universities Kenya. The study was prompted by a recommendation by ministry of higher education in Kenya that students need to be involved more in management of their institutions, following a wave of unrest in Universities Kenya in 2014; with claims of uninvolvement in governance and research indicating unequal decision making opportunities in university. Data was collected by means of a questionnaire distributed among 194 student leaders’ public universities. The findings revealed that universities involved students in governance of public university with a mean rating of 2.95 suggesting that there was shared governance in public Universities. However students’ occasionally participated in decision making, thus, the study established a fairly low, significant positive correlations between the extent of student participation and institutional governance [r = .220, n=190, p=.002]. Hence, the null hypothesis was rejected; there was sufficient evidence to do so (p < .05 at Sig. Level = .05). It was thus concluded that the frequently the students are involved in management, the higher the shared governance in public universities. Hence the study recommended that; occasional student participation in decision making needed to be improved especially in quality assurance and time table setting.