This past week has been a long week in working with students, emotionally supporting them, and then having one who dislikes me.
My teaching week started with a student who does average in my class ending up in my office discussing her work. I suggested she use the writing center, but I also told her this was not a negative thing. I explained to her that I received this suggestion during graduate school, that it takes me a long time to write, and some other things I have been told about my writing. I also told her about a Dean at a college I was once worked at, who was an English professor, who told us that she has her own personal editor because of the struggles she has with writing. The student started crying, and I knew this was beyond the writing center suggestion. To find out, I asked what was going on. She works two shifts at her job and only is able to sleep on the weekends. She can't afford not to. So, I talked with her about how she doesn't have to get an A in my class and that she needs to make her own priorities (i.e. I'm a realist here and know that not working or working less was not going to be an option for her). Passing the class with a C is fine. I don't write this because this will be the only case of this, but this dilemma of working full time and going to school is real for many students at my university.
On Thursday, my next teaching day, I saw a student I had last semester. Her face was puffy, red, and around her eyes even looked purple. My first thought was did she get hurt. We talked and the student found out the day before a good friend of hers committed suicide. The friend shot herself in a car and no one found her until three days later in the car. I listened to her talk and gave her a hug. My heart breaks for her.
Later on Thursday, I had another student, who I adore, in my office. She battles trauma. She is struggling now for various reasons after struggling last semester. She has decided to attend school part time, which is a good thing. And I spent time listening to her, letting her express her emotions, and giving her encouragment.
I do not mind when these things happen. I get sad because of the situations I cannot change for my students. I am glad that they are able to confide in me and have somewhere safe on campus to talk and to have someone listen to them. But yet, it is emotional work. It is the work that we don't necessarily talk about when we talk about teaching. It's what people don't notice about our jobs (also including the time we spend prepping for courses), but the time we take to listen and support our students. I know not all college professors or instructors do this, in listening to students and letting them have a space to express their emotions. Some would say that we are not therapists and this is not our job. Maybe because I was trained in my MSW program to do therapy and did practice in this area before coming back to teaching, I am more apt to do this. But even before this when I was teaching it would happen. However, I think that if you are on the people who can do this for your students, you make a difference. You may be the one person they can talk to. The student may not be able to afford or access therapy. You don't need to be trained in therapy to be a good listener. You don't have to offer advice to the student on their emotional issues, but tell them it's okay to have emotions. The most important thing we learn in being trained in clinical mental health is LISTENING! That is one of the most essential supportive, empathetic things we can do.
But yet, I think it is also important that we do listen to students and in an academic advisement role, help them navigate their options. For instance, a conversation earlier this semester with a student about her schedule, her want to do an internship, a low GPA, and the reasons for this GPA led to a discussion I had with her about managing 18 credit hours for two semesters when she had problems in the past. Some of this is about being human and recognizing what we know about having full plates and what it means to be a student with many obligations.
Yet, the time I took with the students this week and the knowledge I brought to bear on these situations may not get recognized in my annual reviews and scores for teaching for merit. This isn't a new subject and probably is very much gendered that women professors end up doing more of this emotional labor. Whether it counts or not, I think it is time for me to start documenting this time. Some may say it might backfire, but at a regional state school in which our funding is tied into having students complete a certain number of credit hours and a push to mentor students now that they have professional advisers for each department in our college, why shouldn't it count?
Later in the week, let's just say I had a bad teaching week. I could not let go of what happened in my classes this week. Did I screw up? How could I have done better? Can I salvage the class?
I need to get better at having "thicker skin" in these moments in class and not worrying consistently about them.
In talking with colleagues, I was comforted and said not to worry and really to have thicker skin. I was told also first year faculty get tested and generally you get students who don't want to take the other professors. Others told me I should enact my professor role more and tell students what I do find unacceptable.
So, I have to move on from this and repair this class somehow and make it more structured, which is sad for some of the students as we would have good conversations in teaching this class like a seminar. But this is also the day I realized that publications count more. In being treated like I am not a human, but I should be a robot professor was also the day I realized that more time needs to be spent on research than class prep.
I know this all comes with the job. I know I have had difficult students in the past. I know I did things wrong, for which I have and do apologize (which I think is a thing not all professors would do). But with moving to the South from the North, starting a new job this year, and all that comes with this that I have wrote about, my skin has loosened. I remember feeling these things the first year I taught as a graduate student or in a new place before. I have to get thicker skin again.
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