During those conversations, a professor might learn that a student struggles to follow through on tasks, or is mourning the loss of a loved one, or started at a four-year college and feels ashamed to be there. From there, a professor can check in later in the semester, connect a student to other campus resources, or both.
While the conversations are open-ended, the project does provide some suggested questions that professors can ask. In her experience, one of the most powerful is: “How can I help you to be successful?” says Lisa Cherivtch, a professor of business and the project’s other leader. Students’ responses, she says, might touch on their reluctance to speak up in class, or their career aspirations.
Even professors who already make an effort to demonstrate care to their students have seen benefits from doing something more formal, says Joianne Smith, the college’s president. That’s partly because the meetings are with every student: Some students slip through the cracks of other efforts to provide support. Another positive professors have reported, Smith said, is that classroom dynamics improve because more students feel comfortable participating.
Participants in the project have seen higher retention rates than the general student population. The college’s overall persistence rate from fall 2017 to fall 2018 was 51.4 percent. Those who had at least one professor participating in the project continued on at a rate of 65.7 percent. The pattern is especially striking, Smith said, for the college’s black students. Among that group, the overall persistence rate was 42.2 percent, and the rate for those in the project was 60.7 percent.
The college’s largest classes have 35 students. Even then, 15 minute meetings add up: That’s close to nine hours of faculty time. So while the project’s leaders want professors to participate, and to do so with more than one course, if possible, they also make clear that instructors can take a break and come back to it later.
Do you ask students how you can help them? If so, when and how do you pose this question? What kind of responses have you gotten from students, and what has happened as a result? Let me know at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com and your story may be included in a future newsletter.
Actually Caring
Speaking of professors showing students they care, Beth and I were struck by a recent tweet from Claire Major, a professor of higher-education administration at the University of Alabama.
She wrote: “I study teaching and learning in higher education. From all the research (and practice) I’ve done, I think what it comes down to is this: the most important thing for teaching is actually caring about the students and their learning.”
To me, Major’s tweet was an encapsulation of one of the themes I’m most interested in covering: the role that human relationships play in learning. I’ve written about that before, in this story about a professor’s request that students email her “when life happens,” for instance, and this one about faculty members mentoring undergraduates. Still, I know there’s lots more to say. As always, my inbox is open for your examples and ideas: beckie.supiano@chronicle.com
Recommended Read
If you haven’t yet read our colleague Emma Pettit’s powerful story of a professor whose life was transformed by a mass shooting in his classroom, we recommend it. Among other things, it’s a testament to the way scholars use their disciplinary training to make sense of a world that sometimes feels senseless. And it reminded me of conversations I’ve had with professors about how vulnerable to acts of violence they have felt while teaching. You can read it here.
Thanks for reading Teaching. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us: dan.berrett@chronicle.com, beckie.supiano@chronicle.com, or beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com.