Three students are sitting around a table, each with their own laptop, engaging in an animated conversation with each other.

What a class representative should do

Find out what the class thinks - If you're going to tell others what the class thinks, you first need to know it yourself. Often this will naturally come up in conversations with classmates, but it's important to make sure that the class actually thinks what you believe they think. It would be a shame to present what turned out to be the views of a vocal minority as the collective opinion of the class.

Call a class meeting - A useful tool for finding out what the class really thinks is a class meeting. You also have the opportunity to go into detail and find out what solutions the class also wants. There's no right answer to how and how often a class meeting should be held, so it's up to the class on how often and formally they want to talk together.

Speak on behalf of the class - Once you know what the class thinks and wants, it's important that those who can do something about it learns about it. Often this is the course or study programme coordinator, or the meeting points Student Council or Study Programme Committee. It's okay to share your own opinions too, as long as you make it clear what is the class's opinion and what is your personal opinion.

Be solution-oriented - It's easy to talk about problems, but unfortunately they don't disappear just because they're talked about. Often what the class experiences as a problem is something that was considered the best solution when it was put in place. Therefore, the chances are better that everyone will be satisfied if you come up with suggestions for how it can be solved, and possibly adjust if your original solution proposal needs to be changed.

Solve the case at the lowest possible level - Most cases can be solved with a quick conversation rather than a larger formal process. If there's something in a course that can be improved, having a chat with the course coordinator is usually the best option. If a solution can't be found with the course coordinator, you only go up one notch and talk to the study programme coordinator, instead of taking it at a higher level right away. Smaller cases can become harder to solve if those who are able to solve it feel like you are going over their heads.

Be the contact person for the course coordinator - It's not always easy to perceive how the teaching is experienced on the other side of the lectern. Therefore, the course coordinator will sometimes need to talk directly to individual students for a reality check, and the class representatives will then be natural to talk to.

Tell how the class wants to improve their education - A couple of times a semester, the study programme coordinator calls all class representatives who go on the same study programme to the Study Programme Committee. Here, the class representatives, course coordinators and study programme coordinators meet to talk about how to improve the study quality and the social environment of the study.

Be the class' voice in the student democracy - A couple of times a semester, the Local Executive Committee calls all class representatives at the campus to the Student Council to talk about how to improve student everyday life at the campus, and pick up small problems before they become big.

Share their knowledge with fellow students - As a class representative, you'll probably get better acquainted with who you should talk to about what than most of your classmates will. So if they have a problem they want to solve, you may be the one who has the easiest time pointing them in the right direction.

What a class representative shouldn't do

Work on behalf of individual students - Sometimes there will be individual classmates who have bigger problems that need to be solved. While you can be the one who tells them who they should talk to about what, you're not supposed to be the one who speaks on their behalf or solves the problem for them. It quickly becomes a big task to solve the problems of each individual in the class, and it's not your responsibility to do so.

Overwork themselves - The role of class representative is meant to be low-threshold and possible to combine with most study situations. So if you feel that there's too much work on your shoulders, you may have taken on more responsibility than you should. Have a chat with your student council leader or study programme coordinator to see which responsibility someone else should take.

Skip meetings without sending a deputy or giving notice - Enough happens in everyday life that it's not surprising if you sometimes can't attend a meeting in the Student Council or Study Programme Committee. Then it's important that you let your deputy know, so they can represent the class in your absence. They won't know that there's a need for them to attend unless you tell them yourself. And if neither you nor the deputy can attend, you must inform those who are arranging the meeting. If there are several people having trouble attending, the meeting might be postponed to a time that works better for more people.

Photo: Elen Sonja Klouman / Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences