Teaching after the election
Rachel S. Vandagriff, a professor of music history and literature at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, wrote in recently seeking “some wise words for professors for managing student anxieties and distractions in the immediate days around the presidential election.” Vandagriff wondered especially how to go about teaching in the event that the winner of the presidential contest cannot be called on election night.
It’s a concern we imagine is on many readers’ minds.
Vandagriff explained that during the pandemic she asked her students to put their phones away and “hide away in scholarship for a little while,” but she wasn’t sure that would be feasible if everyone was waiting for election news.
“What is the expert advice as we try to continue instruction during what is very likely to be a volatile time?” she asked. “Make space for conversation on the topic and have professors try to manage diverging points of view? Acknowledge the distraction and carry forth? It depends?”
I turned to Nancy Thomas, senior adviser to the president for democracy initiatives at the American Association of Colleges and Universities and executive director of the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education, which is housed there, to share advice for Vandagriff — and all of you.
Thomas emphasized that helping students navigate the election and its aftermath should not fall on the shoulders of any one professor. Colleges themselves have work to do. Their leaders, she said, should be “preparing partnerships ahead of time to win confidence in the election results; allowing time and space for students to process what happens; facilitating opportunities for campus healing, if that’s needed; holding spaces for dialogue and expression, moving to action,” as well as addressing misinformation and preparing for the possibility of violence or threats of violence.
The first step, then, is for instructors to familiarize themselves with campus resources.
Thomas’s comment reminded me that, while we all naturally refer to previous experiences, this isn’t 2016, when many colleges were caught completely off guard by President Trump’s victory. And it isn’t 2020, when Covid precautions left instructors as the only real connection many students had to their colleges.
At the same time, Thomas said, professors do have a role to play. No matter what resources are available to students to promote dialogue or attend to any mental-health concerns, she said, “faculty are special” to them.
The institute’s research on campus climate has found that “students resent professors who ignore public events,” Thomas said. When something significant happens on campus, in the country, or in the world, they expect it to be acknowledged.
So professors should plan to acknowledge the election. And they should be prepared for the possibility of difficult classroom conversations if their students have very different reactions to the election results.
While students do want something from their professors, Thomas said, “I don’t want to infantilize students. Students are feisty; they’re resilient, they are tough, and they are involved in this election.” It’s not, she said, as if everyone is going to have an emotional breakdown in class. At the same time, she said, instructors may want to be attuned to some groups of students — international students come to mind — who might need extra support.
If she were teaching, Thomas said, she might plan to use the first half of the next class after the election to give students time to talk about their reactions and what comes next.
“The day after this election is going to be a day of conflicting emotions,” Thomas said. “It’s going to be a day of conflict.” But remember, she said, “Conflict is an opportunity for learning.”
In any course, in any discipline, there are connections to democracy, Thomas said. A music professor could run a discussion on political music, or have students play music that expresses how they are feeling, for instance. “I’m a big believer of embedding the learning opportunities around democracy across the curriculum,” she said. “And it seems to me that that’s the perfect day to do it. You just have to plan ahead.”
Has your college provided particularly helpful resources or guidance for handling the election’s aftermath? Do you have plans to discuss the outcome — or lack of a clear outcome — with your students right after the election? Have you thought of a way your course content could connect to democracy, and a creative way to share it with your students? Let me know at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com and your example may appear in a future issue of the newsletter.
Remember, too, that we always welcome your questions and are happy to track down expert advice. Just as you probably tell your students, if you’re wondering about something, you’re likely not the only one.
Help for hard conversations
During our conversation, Nancy Thomas highlighted a resource from the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education that I thought readers might want to be aware of: Campus Conflict and Conversation Help Desk. Educators can write in for confidential advice on “difficult, confounding, new, frightening, nasty, threatening, and other conflicts and challenging conversations” that arise inside or outside of the classroom.
Reconnecting with students
Are you struggling to locate the joy of teaching? Do you find that the strategies that used to help when things weren’t gelling in class are no longer sufficient? These challenges are widespread, and anyone facing them might find some good ideas and perspective in this recent Chronicle Advice article by Kristi Rudenga, director of the Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence at the University of Notre Dame.
“No set of tips and tricks will ever form a complete answer to how to meaningfully reach your students,” Rudenga writes. “But finding concrete ways to prioritize human connection, gather input from your students, and communicate with them clearly can go a long way toward breathing life into a flagging classroom.”
Thanks for reading Teaching. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us at beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com or beckie.supiano@chronicle.com.
-Beckie
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