Within middle schooling philosophy student voice is identified as a way to engage young adolescent students with learning and feelings of belonging at school. Teachers are encouraged to co-construct responsive pedagogy and curriculum with their students. However, locating student voice in classrooms, governed as these are by entrenched student and teacher roles, renders student influence problematic. This article illustrates through discourse analysis the discursive intricacies one middle grades class encountered when the students and teacher interacted as pedagogical partners within collaborative action research to revitalise reflection pedagogy in their class program. The interplay between authoritative and dialogic discourses that emerged in the project, contextualised through the analysis of classroom talk, examines the micropolitics at play within the student/teacher partnership. The article illustrates student voice work as simultaneously a nexus for transformation and a problematic alliance when students and teachers work together as partners to co-produce pedagogy and curriculum.