Students who bounce back: A photodiary study of resilience among student carers

Undergraduate students who also have caring responsibilities for others collaborated with researchers in the co-production of data collection, analysis and dissemination. The students were given cameras and asked to take a picture each day for a month. The goal was to capture scenes that would help understand their experiences as students and carers and how caring impacted on their learning experiences. They were given the freedom to portray anything they felt was relevant to the project. In addition to this, the students met with the research team for one-to-one interviews, helping the team to better understand how caring and studying interplay in students’ lives.
The final collaboration between students and researchers came through participatory analysis and an exhibition. Photographs displayed were selected from a pool of over 300 images produced by the students and captions came from their interviews. Students were given final say over which images and words were used to reflect their experiences.