I'm in my fourth year working and studying at the Colorado State University College of Business. Student-facing systems are pretty much 100% run by students, who report to student managers, who report to the IT Director and a student committee representing students who pay the tech fees. It's worked remarkably well, and I've been in several roles throughout my tenure- Lab Technician, network engineer, sysadmin, security team lead, web developer.
In terms of the department's effectiveness, I would say that students receive a great value and enthusiastic service from their colleagues. The risk of system failure is pretty low since we have decent turnover and a hierarchy of newbie and more experienced staff. (It also helps having a good balance of student employees in the technical disciplines and the business administration major.) Everybody starts out with very little experience, and gets direct access to systems they wouldn't otherwise be trusted with. We put heavy emphasis on documentation and formal training requirements, but a lot of stuff is "throwing us in the lake and learning how to swim." I was 18 when I got the security team lead position, and later that week a horrible false positive in $vendor's antivirus definitions rendered every workstation in the college useless. The real-world experience of emergency response and dealing with managing a team and staying accountable to others taught me so much.
I value this kind of opportunity as something much more valuable than an internship, some entry-level jobs, or even my degree program. The job's flexibility with my school schedule and direct pertinence to my studies added several dollars worth of value to the decent student hourly rate.
