Episode 113 Transcript: Student Initiated Confrontations' Impact on Social Work

Lorrie Appleton:
This is Social Work Talks. I'm your host, Lorrie Appleton. Today's program will highlight the rising phenomenon of post-secondary student-initiated confrontation and bullying, which occurs between social work students and their instructors.

Joining us today is Thalia Andin, MSW, RCSW, LCSW, and PhD. Dr. Anderen is a licensed clinical social worker in Illinois, Connecticut, New York and Alberta Canada with over 20 years experience as a therapist. She is an EMDRIA-certified EMDR therapist working with trauma as well as disaster relief, including victims of 9/11, Hurricane Sandy, the Sandy Hook School shooting, and the 2013 Alberta Canada floods.

Thalia has worked in multiple leadership and supervisory roles, including the clinical supervisor at Family Centers, Inc. in Connecticut, and the associate director of counseling initiatives at Calgary Counseling Center in Calgary, Alberta Canada. In addition, Thalia has extensive experience as a social work educator. She was the previous program chair of an undergraduate social work program in Calgary Alberta prior to relocating to the Chicagoland area in 2022. Currently, Thalia instructs MSW courses at the University of Chicago and masters psychology courses at Roosevelt University while maintaining her business, Anderen Counseling and Consulting, PLLC. She recently completed her PhD in social work through Memorial University's School of Social Work in Newfoundland, Canada, focusing on post-secondary social work educators experiences with student-initiated confrontation and hopes to continue further research in this area. Thank you for joining us, Thalia.

Thalia Anderen:
Thanks so much for having me.

Lorrie Appleton:
And what do you do in your free time? Just kidding.

Thalia Anderen:
Free time. That's a whole other podcast.

Lorrie Appleton:
Over the past three decades, there is mounting evidence to suggest that both within and outside the classroom, post-secondary educators are the objects of increasingly concerning behaviors initiated by students. That ranges from incidental rude and disruptive behaviors to more intentional, ongoing, hostile-aggressive, and even violent behaviors. These student-initiated confrontations, also known as SIC, or SIC-

Thalia Anderen:
Or SIC.

Lorrie Appleton:
... in universities, are often exacerbated by a lack of guidance and support by institutional administration, as well as inadequate training and respect to SIC and classroom management. Thalia, your research offers a fascinating look into social work professors who report experiencing students who are directly confrontational and aggressive toward them in and outside the classroom. Why did you choose student-initiated confrontation for your PhD dissertation topic in social work?

Thalia Anderen:
Well, thanks for asking. Well, I was first hired as an adjunct professor about 15 or so years ago, teaching mainly psychology classes to mature business students. And I loved working with those students. I found a lot of gratification and adding teaching to my clinical work. I do remember one student in particular who gave me a bit of a hard time, but according to the other students, gave other instructors a hard time. So I really didn't think much of it at the time.

But fast-forward to 2016 and after working in a clinical social work capacity for the previous 15 years, my entire career, I took on the role of a program chair of an undergraduate social work program, as you mentioned. And very early on, I started experiencing some concerning behaviors by the students, both in my role as an instructor, but also in my role as the chair. And I have to tell you, this was really difficult for me, especially in the beginning as I was trying to make a good impression and get my program noticed. But there were times I felt really anxious. I was losing sleep and I was just in a constant state of worry about these situations, escalating, going to my dean and just being perceived negatively by leadership and by my colleagues.

However, as time went on, I started hearing similar stories from my own instructors and my coworkers as well as from other colleagues who were in similar positions in social work at other schools within the area. And I distinctly remember a colleague from another social work program in the area saying, "My faculty are being bullied every day by students, and I just don't know what to do about it." So on one hand that was really validating to know that I wasn't alone or that my instructors weren't alone in this situation, but it was also deeply concerning, especially because that is not something that I would ever consider doing as a student.

But what was even more concerning and surprising was that it was social work students who were acting in this sort of a way. It really started to become clear that what I was witnessing was part of some sort of a larger phenomenon, yet it didn't really seem like a lot was being done to address it. And so all of that really led me to start thinking more and more about the phenomenon. Why is it happening? What's contributing to this? And if instructors and leadership are supposed to be in these positions of power and authority, why is it more being done to address these kinds of situations? And what kinds of training and preparation are we as instructors receiving to be able to prevent and to handle these sorts of situations? Then more specifically, what about SIC within social work? There's not a lot of research on this topic in general, but there was a dearth of literature on SIC within social work education. So that's really how I decided to pursue this topic when I went back to school for my doctorate.

Lorrie Appleton:
Wow. So based on your personal experience and your professional experience, that pulled together to make you think about using that as your dissertation topic?

Thalia Anderen:
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Lorrie Appleton:
Interesting. And what were the findings from your research?

Thalia Anderen:
Yeah, so for my research, I conducted a qualitative study. And for any research types who were listening out there, it was a descriptive phenomenological analysis. But I interviewed five... Oh, I'm sorry, I interviewed 15 social work instructors across Canada because that's where I was living at the time. They all had to have had at least one experience with SIC at some point in their social work teaching career. And the participants had a range of teaching experience. I had some who had had up to 50 years, some who were in their late 70s, representing genders, race, backgrounds, and they were teaching both at the undergrad and the graduate social work level.

The aim of the study was really to look at... It was to get a better understanding of how SIC was being experienced by these participants, both in terms of how and why they saw it manifesting, how they felt they were both personally and professionally impacted. And then I also looked at whether or not they reported those incidents, and more specifically, how they felt their institutions and leadership were responding to SIC as well as what kind of training they had actually received. And then finally, I looked at what the participants felt the implications were for social work education, but also the profession.

So a real key finding was that SIC really is a present and serious problem within schools of social work that have major implications, not only on just the social work instructors, but also the students, the educational system itself, and ultimately the profession. For example, just speaking about the instructor piece, each participant reported really experiencing a lot of negative impacts, both professionally, but particularly in terms of their mental health and their wellbeing. Words like anxiety, stress, many a sleepless night I heard. But one of the biggest words that I heard was fear. Fear that they would encounter more of these situations, fear for their safety, physical and emotional safety. But fear that those situations would escalate and that they wouldn't be believed or supported by their leadership. And certainly fear for their future careers, both within the institution and externally. And I mean, some even describe their experiences using terms like trauma, PTSD, to the point that many either left teaching for a period of time. Some left it altogether and they've never taught since.

Lorrie Appleton:
And these are social work instructors?

Thalia Anderen:
Yeah. And I mean, think about the loss to the students and not having some of those really experienced and talented instructors. But not surprising was that not one of the participants who I interviewed had been mandated to receive any sort of training. In fact, many of them didn't even know this was something that they would be facing as an instructor, right?

But just despite all of this, maybe not surprising, but there was a real reluctance and hesitancy to report their experiences to leadership either because they had reported in the past and they hadn't really felt supported, or in some cases they didn't even get a chance to report because the students bypassed having a conversation with the participant directly and went straight to higher level of leadership.

So as you can imagine, when they aren't feeling backed by their leadership, if they're not feeling supported, then there was a real pressure they felt to change the way that they taught, whether it was either giving higher grades, they felt this pressure to inflate grades sometimes. I heard a lot of participants talking about watering down the content that was being delivered in the classroom, sometimes even eliminating it altogether because they were trying to avoid any sort of discussion about something that would upset the students or bring about any sort of distress that could lead to these sorts of SIC behaviors.

Lorrie Appleton:
Right. So you talked a bit about what contributing factors were part of the phenomenon. Was there information that surprised you? You talked some about that, but I want you to go on a little further with that.

Thalia Anderen:
Sure. Well, there were definitely a few things that surprised me. I mean, first of all, one of the other key findings that came up had to do with the primary drivers of this phenomenon and how the whole phenomenon works. For example, previous research that was out there before really focused on this phenomenon as being a result of that student instructor dyad. And while they both contribute to both the start of these problems and the existence, that this research study actually offered a new perspective, which said there is this third element which is institutional leadership that's really playing a significant role. So that was surprising in and of itself how that came together.

But I think the other thing that was really surprising was just all of the participants were really impacted by their situations. And some of them had multiple situations and talked more about the themes of what they saw. And then I had a handful who had only experienced one isolated incident, but that incident was so impactful that they felt compelled to participate in this study.

But despite all that, I think what really surprised me is that although I knew I would hear stories that had a lot of intensity and that there was going to be a lot of emotion involved in it, I don't think that even I understood how significant this problem was. But despite all of that, I think what was so striking to me was that even though all these participants had such negative experiences that number one, there was still such a compassion for their students and really trying to understand where those behaviors might be coming from. Was it stress? Was it difficulty at home? Was it lack of preparation? But their concern for the future of social work and the future for harm being done to clients far overshadowed any of the negative impacts that they were experiencing on a more personal level.

Lorrie Appleton:
Right. So there's a lot of systemic response and contributing factors regarding this?

Thalia Anderen:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think one of the things that kept coming up were phrases like things were being swept under the rug, or they felt like leadership was well aware that this phenomenon existed, but there was such a concern, especially with the advance of social media and the ability to put grievances and complaints out there in the public, that higher levels of leadership are really concerned about damage to the institutional reputation. And damage to reputation equals financial consequences. And so clearly, we know that money needs to come in for a college and university to continue. So that fear that leadership had was really at the heart of it, what the participants felt for sure.

In terms of some other contributing factors, I'm sure it won't come as a surprise, but consumerism and entitlement was a huge one that was talked about. That because students are paying for their education, that there's almost this sense of the customer is always right, and so therefore these expectations that they should get these higher level grades and even sometimes the degree because they're paying for it.

And I think another problem, which certainly is out there in the literature but also came up in the research, was how the North American Educational and Parenting System is partly responsible that students just aren't being challenged in the same way that they were in previous generations. And so by the time they get to college and university, they don't necessarily have the academic preparation, but also may not have some of the coping and mental health preparation, which then sometimes can lead to some of these other behaviors. I mean certainly there were some social work specific contributing factors as well, which just we know that compared to some other disciplines, the kinds of topics that we talk about in social work courses can be difficult. They can be challenging, they can bring up a lot of different emotions, and sometimes that emotion can translate into SIC.

I think when you asked before what was surprising, another thing that came up so frequently among the participants was this idea of misrepresented advocacy, right? We're teaching students to advocate on behalf of social justice issues, but there was this real felt sense that sometimes students misperceive what advocacy actually is, and instead they think of it as, "If I don't get what I want, then I need to fight to get those needs met."

Lorrie Appleton:
Listeners, if you are like me, you may be thinking about all the implications associated with Thalia's research. I know I have been. We have social work professors who likely did not anticipate the need for classroom management training. Thalia has talked about that. There are social work students who are unaware how their communication skills may be perceived by peers and within their field placements, or that social work administrators may be unaware of how they might best support social work instructors who have the charge of molding our best and brightest in the field. It is such an interesting topic.

How can social work universities support professors while enlightening students regarding the impact of their behavior in class?

Thalia Anderen:
Yeah, thanks for asking that. I mean, I think it has to be looked at both from a macro perspective as well as a micro perspective. And like I said, I mean a theme that kept coming up again and again throughout the research was just the participants feeling like leadership of all levels need to do a better job of supporting instructors.

And so first of all, one of the ways that leadership can support faculty is by establishing clear policies and procedures around this phenomenon, whether it's code of conduct, academic honesty, but also some of these other behavioral issues, but actually upholding the policies. That was talked about again and again, that we actually have policies, but if they're not being upheld, then how sound are those policies?

But one of the other things that was talked about was just this general need for more mandatory training regarding student initiated confrontations. You said it yourself, I mentioned it, that a lot of times we don't expect to have to face this sort of a situation in adult learning, but particularly in social work. I mean, let's face it, instructors in college and universities are generally higher because of their field experience, because of their subject matter expertise. They're not higher because of teaching, teaching experience most likely.

So it's really important that although we need to address this at a systemic level, that instructors need to know that this is something that they will most likely face at some point in their career, but there are strategies to be able to both prevent it and also to mitigate situations when they do come up. And that's part of why for one of my courses, I actually developed a half-day workshop that addresses all of these different issues that teach people about what the phenomenon is, why it happens, what the impacts can be, but most importantly, it provides instructors with those sound kinds of strategies to be able to put in place to be better prepared.

Lorrie Appleton:
Yeah, it sounds like that course is really needed.

Thalia Anderen:
Yes.

Lorrie Appleton:
This is a complex issue, isn't it?

Thalia Anderen:
Yes.

Lorrie Appleton:
Do you have suggestions regarding how to support social work instructors who are experiencing confrontation from their students?

Thalia Anderen:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, again, I think on a broader level, it's really important for schools and departments to create space for instructors to be able to talk about this. I feel like a lot of the participants mentioned feeling very isolated, that they were so worried about how they would be perceived or misperceived, that a lot of times they kept it to themselves. This was especially common for participants who were teaching as adjuncts or as part-time contract instructors because they didn't have that same collegiality. They were coming in, they were teaching their courses and they were going. And I think because they were always reliant on getting hired for their next contract, there was an even deeper fear of coming forward about this. So creating that space, leaving time in staff meetings and faculty meetings, bringing that training.

But in terms of what instructors can do specifically, there are certain things that they can do to try to prevent it. I mean, first of all, using something like a syllabus or a course outline is a really ideal place to try to address things and put things in writing. Using behavioral statements and being really clear about what constitutes professional behavior, what are the consequences if students or instructors act in a manner that's not professional. We have a unique opportunity to bring in the NASW Code of Ethics, to be able to tie professionalism to adherence and aligning with our Code of Ethics, talking about how those kinds of behaviors can do harm out there in the community. It can do harm to those we serve. And also just being really clear and being transparent. Research shows that students are more likely to out if they are unclear about assignment expectations, course expectations. So just being very clear in writing, taking that time in class throughout the semester to review some of those expectations is really helpful.

And then for instructors, to try to be accessible. Show up to class a few minutes early. Stay late. Offer office hours or times to meet with students. If you notice that a student might be having some struggles, reach out, check in with them. If situations escalate, there's some mitigation strategies. Just knowing the how and the when to address some of these things. Addressing things in front of other students is not always the best way to do it, so to try to arrange confidential in a private meeting, but also being really clear about what you are and you are not willing to tolerate in terms of behavior. And if a student becomes really highly reactive, it may be time to end that meeting and come back to it at a later date or for both the student and the instructor to bring in someone else so it's not just the two of them to help to mediate that meeting.

So those are just a couple of strategies. And obviously, the workshop goes into a lot more detail about those different strategies and it gives the participants an opportunity to talk about strategies that they've used that have been helpful and to have a collective exchange of ideas.

Lorrie Appleton:
It also sounds like your research has helped with managing some of the shame connected to being a professor trying to do a good thing and then having this experience. So it's very powerful. Do you have any thoughts on that?

Thalia Anderen:
I hope so. I definitely hope so. And I think, again, I think people are being confronted with this type of a situation on a regular basis, but they're not necessarily talking about it. Or if they are, it's in these small groups and it's not being talked about on a broader level. It's important to talk about, because it is something that I don't know that we're going to be able to fix the problem overnight, but we can address it. Certain educators might be more likely targets. I mean, fortunately, the research shows that educators or instructors who have non-dominant identities. Educators of color, women, gender, all the sorts of genders and different identities, those are often more likely to be targeted. And that was certainly the case in my research as well. So that's just something that is important for them to be aware of as well.

Lorrie Appleton:
Do you have anything else that you'd like to add regarding this topic?

Thalia Anderen:
I think one thing that I just want to reiterate is that this is not something that all students engage in. And my research was not designed to put a blame on students. It wasn't designed to put a blame on anyone. It was really more just to understand the essence of the phenomenon, how it worked, and to really look at it from the educator's perspective. But it doesn't mean that that student perspective isn't important. It doesn't mean that the leadership perspective isn't important. But really the main thing is that, this is a serious problem in a field like social work where we're putting students out there in the field, we're putting them out there for practicums and for paid employment. It's that much more important for everyone involved, including leadership, to be well aware of what's happening within this field and that potential to do harm.

But the good news is that we all have a really great opportunity and a responsibility to mitigate this issue and to work on addressing it and coming together in a more collaborative way so that this phenomenon doesn't have to be just part of our job as a lot of times we're being told.

Lorrie Appleton:
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, Thalia, NASW thanks you for sharing your research with us.

Thalia Anderen:
[inaudible 00:24:49].

Lorrie Appleton:
And listeners, you can find details regarding Dr. Anderen and this topic in the show notes and resources section of our website. Visit us at Social Work Talks for other innovative podcasts. Thanks for watching.

Thalia Anderen:
Thank you.

Speaker 3:
You have been listening to NASW Social Work Talks, a production of the National Association of Social Workers. We encourage you to visit NASW's website for more information about our efforts to enhance the professional growth and development of our members to create and maintain professional standards and to advance sound social policies. You can learn more at www.socialworkers.org. And don't forget to subscribe to NASW Social Work Talks wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks again for joining us. We look forward to seeing you next episode.