Benard (1995) discusses the value of students having opportunities for meaningful participation at school:
"Providing youth with opportunities for meaningful involvement and responsibility fosters resilience in a number of ways. Rutter (Pines, 1984) found that schools that gave children a lot of responsibility had low levels of delinquency and dropouts. In these schools, children 'participated very actively in all sorts of things that went on in the school; they were treated as responsible people and they reacted accordingly' (p. 65). Similarly, the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation's 15-year study of the Perry Preschool Project demonstrates the benefits of creating opportunities for children to participate in decision making from an early age. This study discovered that children from impoverished inner-city environments who planned and made decisions about their school activities in their preschool years were, at the age of 19, significantly less (as much as 50 percent) involved in using drugs, delinquency, teen pregnancy, or school failure (Berruta-Clement et al., 1984). A follow-up study of this population at age 27 found that participants in the project committed far fewer crimes, have higher earnings, and possess a greater commitment to marriage than other adults from similar backgrounds (Weikart & Schweinhart, 1993).
Participating in decisions about one's life and future is a fundamental human need, closely tied to the need to have some power over one's life. Several educational reformers believe that ignoring this need--not only among children, but also among families, teachers, and other school staff--makes schools alienating places (Glasser, 1990; Wehlage et al., 1989). Sarason (1990) states it simply: 'When one has no stake in the way things are, when one's needs are provided no forum, when one sees oneself as the object of unilateral actions, it takes no particular wisdom to suggest that one would rather be elsewhere' (p. 83).
The challenge for schools is to engage all children's innate desire and ability to learn by providing them with opportunities to participate in meaningful activities and roles. This is especially critical for students of color whose families and communities have been systematically excluded from fully participating in the social, economic, and political life of this country. Infusing opportunities for children to participate in the life of the classroom and school doesn't require a special program; it requires teachers to relinquish their role as 'sage on the stage' and become the 'guide on the side.' Teachers must willingly share power with students and base their classrooms on reciprocity and collaboration instead of control and competition; in other words, the classroom must become a democratic community. Asking questions that encourage critical, reflective thinking (including those around current social problems), making learning more hands-on, involving students in curriculum planning, using participatory evaluation strategies, letting students create the 'classroom constitution' (Sarason's [1990] term for agreements governing classroom interaction), and employing approaches like cooperative learning, peer helping, cross-age mentoring, and community service all give students opportunities for meaningful participation. Such strategies bond young people to their school community and promote all the traits of resiliency: social competence, problem-solving, autonomy, and--especially critical to urban youth--a sense of a bright future (Benard, 1991, 1992; Kohn, 1993)." (pp. 72-73)
