Instructors Spend ‘Emotional Labor’ in Diversity Courses, and Deserve Credit for It

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Diversity courses help sensitize students to a wide array of cultural backgrounds and outlooks, and many colleges include them in their general-education requirements. But because of the sometimes-tense subject matter, a new paper says, faculty members who teach those courses often bear a particularly heavy emotional load that isn’t generally recognized or compensated.

In the paper, presented on Wednesday at the Association for the Study of Higher Education’s annual meeting, in Tampa, Fla., the authors urge colleges and universities to prepare academics for that burden, and to acknowledge, document, and reward it.

According to a 2015 survey, 60 percent of member institutions in the Association of American Colleges and Universities reported including diversity courses in their general-education requirements.

The authors of the new paper — Ryan A. Miller and Cathy D. Howell, both of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and Laura Struve, of the University of Texas at Austin — interviewed 38 teachers of those courses at three unnamed liberal-arts institutions in two neighboring Southern states. The three institutions were an elite, private college and a private, highly selective college, both with white enrollments of about 70 percent, and a midsize public regional college that’s about one-third African-American, 10 percent other students of color and international students, and 60 percent white.

The authors of the paper, which has not yet been submitted for publication, define the instructors’ emotional labor as “attending to students’ needs beyond course content, both inside and out of the classroom, as well as addressing one’s own emotional management and displays as a faculty member.”

Some interviewees said they consider that kind of labor integral to any kind of teaching. But many felt that the nature of diversity courses and the fact that they may be taught disproportionately by women and members of ethnic and other underrepresented groups — who studies show are generally thrust into heavier unofficial counseling roles anyway — raise the emotional stakes.

In a number of cases, the teachers felt compelled to reveal to their students aspects of their own background because they expect students to do the same. Yet they also want to demonstrate objectivity and to reassure students that they won’t use their minority identities in an antagonistic way against them.

Teachers of such courses are plunged into various roles. They are protectors of students who feel hostility from peers toward their points of view. They try to reassure students during political upheaval — for instance, one faculty member checked in particularly with Muslim students in the wake of the 2016 election.

Intense classroom discussions sometimes spill over into chats about personal issues after class or during office hours. The three institutions in the study all have relatively small class sizes, and students feel as if they know their professors but don’t necessarily know a counselor. The teachers must decide whether a student just needs to talk out a problem, or whether the student should be referred to mental-health or other services.

‘Emotional Exhaustion’

Teachers of the courses don’t necessarily see the emotional weight they carry as a problem, but cite “emotional exhaustion” all the same. One said that “if you’re not willing to walk that growth journey with them, then you shouldn’t be teaching this course.” Another said that although she performs emotional labor “constantly, excessively, and all the time,” she harnesses the emotional energy into “better discussions, more probing conversations, students making more connections.”

Interviewees “who saw emotional labor as an expectation … tended to discuss such work as a burden, and as tense and contested.” But those who considered that labor as at least partly “a matter of choice often saw the work as valuable and beneficial to their teaching.” Some saw it as “both an expectation and a choice, or saw choice in embracing the expectation.”

Many interviewed, especially women, saw a need to set boundaries. They try to observe strict time limits on office-hour sessions — 20 minutes, say — and to make clear that academic issues take precedence and that personal matters should come up only at the end if there’s time.

Those intentions often crumble, though. Said one faculty member: “Students who come into my office crying, they’re not crying about their papers, or their grades. … They’re coming in talking about microaggressions, about things that happen on campus, things people are saying to them.”

Then again, not all of those interviewed were willing to cast themselves in the role of empath. Some men, in particular, do their best to opt out of emotional labor altogether, the authors report. One said that he “conveyed he did not have the extra time to engage in emotional work.” As he put it: “I’m usually so busy with grading and designing lectures and discussions that deep emotional engagement is something that in a way there’s not time for because I’ve got a stack of midterms on my desk.”

The authors recommend that colleges make the discussion of emotional labor more visible. Faculty members chat about it in hallways, but it needs to be incorporated into faculty handbooks, contracts, and tenure and promotion documents. Those teaching diversity courses, where the demand for emotional labor may be greater, should get more training and support (invited speakers, workshops), and recognition for that work. And the authors suggest more research on emotional labor in a greater variety of institutions.

The authors also reveal their own experiences. For instance, Miller, “a white, queer, cisgender man and tenure-track faculty member,” is usually sought out by students for course and research advice. In contrast, Howell, “a black, hetero, cisgender woman” not on the tenure track at a predominately white institution, performs significant emotional labor, “being the depository of anger and frustration experienced by students.”

“Students,” she writes, “feel liberated to approach me in ways that they would not do to white males or females. To a certain extent faculty are the same. I was told early in my professional career to never have tissues on my desk, as students and faculty would take it as an invite to emotionally disclose. I am currently on my third box of tissues that I used to keep in my desk drawer.”

Alexander C. Kafka is a Chronicle senior editor. Follow him on Twitter @AlexanderKafka, or email him at alexander.kafka@chronicle.com.