Student Participation in the Educational Process

Quality university education includes training individuals to actively contribute to their own development, as well as contributing to the development of the collective community. Higher education as an effective process of self-development, self-enabling and permanent self-improvement requires changing the position of the student's role as responsible and innovative subjects in the educational process. The flexibility, dynamism, and openness to constant exchange with the environment in the programming model, which takes place in an educational institution, requires mutual partnership and participatory role of subjects. In this paper, the authors start from the humane assumption of participation, then exploratory bring to connection the students' confidence in their self-efficacy and attitudes of partnership and participation in order to encourage effective learning in the educational process. Participation of young people in a community implies their lives without stereotypes and prejudices, with properly constructed attitudes and values, achievements and behaviour of others, students' motivation for independence and freedom in decision making, expectations and success, as well as persistence in their work. Also, the authors associate participatory competence of students which includes the ability to negotiate, to understand their own and others' emotions as well as handling emotions, democracy, autonomy, conduct of behaviour, teamwork, social promotion, extraversion, and the realization of their own and collective or group goals. Innovations in the educational process will allow the students to, as often as possible, be found in conditions that activate all their mental and physical abilities, strengthen motivation and wider interests, cultivate emotion and will, desirable virtues, humanity and responsibility. This paper provides new insights about participatory activities, methods and methodological procedures, as well as forms of communication that contribute to encouraging the development of students' learning, where the theme for exploring new possibilities is recognized.