Lessons in listening: where youth participation meets student as producer

Abstract This article draws on the author’s experiences of undergraduate student involvement in a research project consulting local young people about what they want from youth services in their local area. It argues that there are clear parallels between the debates about young people’s participation and engagement in public service delivery and the dilemmas posed by the student as producer agenda. Through the comparison of these two sets of literature, the notions of student as producer and the student voice come under scrutiny and the potential and limits of student involvement in research are explored.