Abstract
The article substantiates and systematizes institutional and organizational mechanisms of public governance aimed at fostering higher education students' responsibility for their own learning and development – academic agency. The problem is addressed through overcoming the systemic dysfunctions of paternalistic and consumerist models, the latter reducing the learner to a passive recipient of public services. Academic agency is conceptualized as an integral capacity for intentional goal-setting, navigating individual educational trajectories, exercising self-regulated learning, and assuming ethical responsibility for academic outcomes. Drawing on agency concepts (OECD, A. Bandura), self-determination theory (E. Deci, R. Ryan), and self-regulated learning (B. Zimmerman), typical institutional barriers are identified. A structured triad of governance mechanisms is proposed: normative-regulatory, organizational-institutional, and informational-analytical. The key institutional barriers to the development of student agency were identified, including excessive administrative regulation, the simulation of choice, the predominance of summative assessment, and a control-and-supervision model of ensuring academic integrity. It was concluded that the implementation of the proposed mechanisms does not require significant additional budgetary allocations, as it is based on the reengineering of existing academic procedures and ensures a balance between student autonomy and institutional support.