I considered calling this post ‘teaching
with empathy’, but I realized this did not entirely capture what I have been
addressing in the past year of my career. Being an empathetic teacher is of
course something that anyone involved in education should aspire to be, it is
part of the mandate of our profession. But being an empathetic teacher does not
cover the hurdle I felt in front of me in my almost 20 years of being involved
in education. Hurdle is a good word for how I felt, or maybe a wall, or possibly
some form of obstacle in what I saw as the clearer path that lay ahead. That clearer
path would make everything easier and my relationship with my students and my colleagues
would just smoothly follow that clearer path once I figured out how to remove
the hurdle or at least get over it. I focused so much of my energy on trying to
identify what that ‘missing piece’ was, the key. I focused my attention, as I
had been trained to do, in finding the answer from books, academic advice, an
intellectual answer to what faced me. I continued to project on to my students
what I was doing to myself – I was pushing myself, being hard on myself,
aspiring to get that ‘A’. As with so much that happens in our lives it was someone
else that ultimately gave me the push to find my ‘key’.
I have had many incredible students over
the years, many of whom have opened my eyes to the world as much as I have
taught them, but there are a few (and I hope there will be many more) that I
truly admire and look up to despite their being fewer in life years’ experience
to me. One of these students is Rose. Rose took my third-year ‘Urbanization in
the Global South’ course two and a half years ago, she followed this with my
fourth-year ‘Geographical Narratives of the Middle East’ two years ago, then a
Directed Study course focusing on women in Vancouver wearing the hijab and
their experience, finally last summer (2018) she worked with me as a research
assistant on my Syrian Refugees story. All of this and Rose is a science
student now in medical school! Needless to say, I was impressed by her, but
most of all I was inspired by how much she challenged me. Rose constantly came
to my office hours, questioned the grades I gave her (they were all A’s) and
wanted clarity on why I did what I did in my lectures and course design. Students
question their grades all the time, but Rose was more interested in
understanding why and really trying to relate to me. One day last summer when I
was asking Rose on her opinion of how I might improve or adapt my ‘Geographical
Narratives of the Middle East’ course, she said to me, “Don’t be so hard on students.
I personally am motivated and inspired by being pushed but not all students are
like that.” Her honesty and directness really hit home for me and made me sit
back and think about what propelled me to be so hard on my students. The truth
was, it was because I was being hard on myself. The answer to how to overcome
my hurdle as I saw it was not in some academic book or something I could
uncover through research; the answer was inside of me and it was up to me to
find it.
Rose played an important role but so did a
specific project that I created for my students. Inspired by Syrian refugees I
met in Vancouver and conversations with Pete, I saw it at first as a means of
keeping my academic research on migration alive, as well as fueling my
interested in the role of technology in education. As time went on and I worked
with my research assistants, started to listen to the stories of the refugees, and
was amazed by how it came together with the technology, I was struck with what
an important role I have to play in education. My role is not to have all my
students get A’s (that is not a real measure of learning anyways – I encourage
you all to watch Ken Robinson’s discussion on this), my role is have my
students walk away with a broader sense of the world and a sense of connection
with different people and their lives and journeys – the word empathy entered into
my daily vocabulary.
I cannot pinpoint a moment when this
powerful concept of empathy began to shape my thinking, what I do know is that
it fundamentally changed me. Ultimately empathy has gradually enabled me to
truly embrace the approach to teaching which I have intellectually written
about in my teaching and education statements for years, but never internalized
emotionally. I needed to approach my teaching in the same way I approached my
life, being truly open vulnerable and accepting of emotional difference. I
cannot possibly expect everyone I meet to have the same approach as me, and
hence I cannot assume the same of my students. The truth is, the real gift of
life is being open to difference. We may never see the world from another
person’s perspective, but we can certainly aspire to be open to how they
approach the world acknowledging it is different from our own. Empathy is
ultimately about connecting, listening and communicating, allowing the other
person to know they are heard and that their position is acknowledged. Many
blame technologies for having enabled us to disconnect from each other, I see
the use of technologies simply as another tool facilitating the disconnection
but not causing it. What causes the disconnection? I draw the answer from my
students as they share their concerns with me: we live in a world where more
and more we feel we have to get to a destination. I wrote about this in my
previous blog on belonging. My students, a lot of whom are international
students, are compelled by what grade they will achieve because this will get
them the best job, the money they need to buy a house and a fancy car, to feel
like they have a role and ‘belong’ in society.
Back to my students and how I have tried to
embody my empathy and bring it into my teaching and learning approaches – most
of all I listen. That’s not an easy task for most and especially for me, I have
opinions, ideas and passions I like to share, but I listen knowing the sweetest
sense is when a student can walk into my office or come to me after class and
really try and relate to me as one human to another. I give my students lots of
time and space to complete assignments, providing them with a lot of guidance
but ultimately encouraging them to share their own experiences. I focus on the
positive of what they offer me - not all of them will A’s and that’s ok. Most
of all I try and think through how they can relate to each other as peers, not
driven by what they think they should be doing, but truly drawing on their
connections what they have in common.
I’m still learning and the most important thing I can keep doing is listening to my students, as I am trying to do generally in my life. I no longer see a hurdle because I no longer see that there is a ‘clear path’ on the other side, rather there are moments, learning and life twists and turns. I end this entry in much the same way I did on the previous entry on belonging, I don’t have answers on what makes an empathetic educator, but I do know it should be focused on fostering connections and that is a general life lesson.
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