CEP 817
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Learning Tech Through Design
Module 1 Lab: 55 Fiction
S — Your idea for this assignment is very original. However, it’s not up to the standards I usually expect of you. I understand this is a stressful time for you, but it’s essential that you keep up with your schoolwork. I am always available during my office hours for any reason. Please try much harder.
I had heard of this genre before on NPR. I think they do a monthly contest, as a matter of fact, with the 6 word version — I think. But the first time I heard the show, I thought it would be so fun to try this! I remember trying to come up with something as original and creative as the writers on the show had. However, I’m sure I got distracted, and I forgot all about it. What I learned though, was that you don’t want to write a traditional narrative, you want some type of specific situation where a complete idea can be expressed. One of the ones I heard previously was a personals ad. I’d like to do more of this in my “free time” — ha, ha, ha.
Module 1 Problem of Practice
I originally wanted to address a more pressing issue at my school, which is the negativity and low morale that is currently the environment that I work in. There has been a breakdown in communication, trust and respect between the administration and faculty that has caused an extremely dysfunctional work situation. But I’m not particularly adept and solving interpersonal problems, and in addition to this being too big an issue to address, I just am straight dry as far as ideas go about how I could work with this problem. This seemed like something I just couldn’t handle, so I changed my topic.
However, this can’t be ignored because it affects the quality of my life. Having said that, I’m still not sure how to go about addressing this problem. Luckily though, there is another person in the class that has a similar issue, and once I heard from her I felt like we might be able to work together, and I felt like I had some support in working on something that is so important to me. And that can make all the difference when dealing with something so overwhelming.
Module 2 Lab: Empathy & Perspective Taking
This exercise didn’t do as much to help me empathize as I would have liked. I was more concerned about taking up as little of my students’ time as possible, so I was stressed for that reason. I was hoping to get the student to teach only in Vietnamese because then it would have been more of a reflection of what it’s like for my students living and learning in an English only environment. However, I do already have a sense of what it’s like to live in a foreign country and not know the language — I have lived in both China and Mexico. For someone who’s usually high on the anxiety scale on a good day, it’s a nerve racking experience.
Module 2 Problem of Practice: Empathy
I chose to address as my problem of practice the toxic environment in which I work. I currently work in a college that is highly dysfunctional in its relationship between the administration and the faculty. It’s been stressful at the least and demoralizing and depressing at the worst. I plan on creating something that will help my colleagues to cope with this dysfunction. From my problem of practice comes the design process.
Art
The image really tries to convey the idea that my general positive and hopeful disposition (the light) was diminished and nearly extinguished by the environment.
Step one, empathy. I really wanted to understand what the other faculty are feeling. I know what I’m feeling, but I want to get as close as I can to what they are feeling. I think, since I work with people who are experts in their respective fields, that asking them to express themselves from that perspective would get to the core of their conflict. And that is what I asked. From the perspective of your discipline, how would you express what it’s like to work in this environment? And I’ve been getting some amazing work back from sketches to creative writing and quotes. It’s invigorating just to see how talented and creative my colleagues are. That in itself makes me feel grateful to work with them.
Media
In fact, most people are being squeezed in their little cubicle, and their creativity is forced out elsewhere, because the company can’t use it. The company is organized to get rid of variants. — Scott Adams
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/s/scottadams467774.html#PPcBPyrlVejyb910.99
Most of what I got back was a mix of anger, feelings of victimization, a sense of misogyny and resentment at a patriarchal management style. Everyone was struggling. No one got away without being affected negatively by the conflict. However, there were messages of hope as well. Most were trying to overcome the obstacles and bring some positivity to their work lives. I also received a lot of positive feedback about my request to participate in the project. There was only one faculty member who was hesitant to participate, and I didn’t expect to receive anything, but later I found a submission in my mailbox. My colleagues want to tell their stories. No one in administration will listen to us, and the fact that someone wants to listen to them is powerful.
English
How do I feel? Outraged, insulted, sidelined, silenced, gutted, pointless, not valued, ignored, made irrelevant, feared. I feel—clearly—fragmented. I am taken out of myself. I don’t know who I am. I am not recognized for my virtues. I am defined by a story others need to tell about me to assuage their fears, staunch their responsibilities, and shore up what passes for their manhood. Excuse me, I should say “what passes for their humanity.” I am the scapegoat.
I think my project itself will revolve around this need to be heard. There’s a lot of research out there about the power of stories and being heard as a healing and coping mechanism. (Brene Brown talks a lot about this as well as some other authors including Tara Brach and Bessel Van Der Kolk.) At this point I’m considering creating a forum for this purpose. If we need to be heard, that would be a way to encourage and support that. Integrating some research, which will appeal the academics I work with, with their stories can be combined into one very cohesive project.
Module 3 Lab: Define Part 1
Vlacschushed — (vlak skoosh t) v. Past tense of vlacshush. The release of adrenaline and hormones that accompany the feeling one experiences when a computer or phone is dropped esp. down a flight of stairs, on the cement or in a toilet.
Nonverbum— (non verbum) v. The act of asking about the name of a word that has no name, such as the plastic at the end of a shoe lace.
Coderage — (kod rag) v. The state of mind that is created when one cannot remember a password. It is a mild vlacshushing effect, although physiologically it leans more toward the release of cortisol rather than adrenaline. Persons that are experiencing coderage should be avoided as they are highly unpredictable.
Part 2
My redesign comes from my experience as a teacher. In the school in which I currently work, we have a very unique group of students. I work in a Catholic seminary college which teaches to priests, bothers, sisters and prospective priests. Most of our students come from abroad from developing countries. 99% of our students are highly motivated and work extremely hard on their schoolwork. My problem as a teacher is that I don’t get the positive response I would like from my students about my teaching. Students complain about my classes more than I would like, and I’m not getting the feedback I want at the end of the semester either. It makes me feel like I’m a bad teacher, which I know is not true, but hurts nevertheless.
As I was having a meltdown about another criticism from a student, I caught a colleague in the hallway. I asked her how she handles it when students complain about her teaching. She said students don’t complain about her teaching — which can’t possibly be true because she’s notorious for making students cry — but what she said after, especially coming from her, meant something to me. She said that I need to not be so strict, that the students need more hand-holding. They’re used to being told what to do and getting a lot of help to do it.
That made me realize that the problem is not that the students can’t follow rules, or they don’t listen, or they can’t figure out how to solve their own problems, the issue is that I have not adapted to the kind of student I teach. I teach to the kind of student that I am — very independent, driven and self-motivated. So I decided to cut these students a break. Instead of being very strict and inflexible, when they ask things of me I usually accommodate them. I think the students will like me more, and although I have only been doing this for a short time, but I already feel much less stressed and competent in my job.
Module 3 Problem of Practice: Define Part 1
A. The faculty are unhappy in the work environment with the administrators. Why? They are yelled, bullied, reprimanded, fired, ignored, taken away our voting rights, nitpicked us, forced us to change things in our areas that they have no knowledge about. Why? They have taken away our power, sense of safety, feeling of competence. Why? Nobody listens to us and nobody cares. Why? Faculty feel unvalued and/or bullied.
B.
C. Hardworking, personable, highly intelligent faculty need same for administrative position at small private seminary college. Interpersonal skills a must! Ideally the person in this position would be able to rebuild the damage that was done by previous administration. The ability to communicate well, inspire and express appreciate for the value of faculty necessary. If you are a Pope Francis-type then please apply.
Define Part 2
The problem that I’m working with is that my administration not only undervalues the faculty, but strategically undermines them as well. Within this problem of practice I don’t have recourse to change the situation, but what I can do is address the perspective that we have. The root cause seems to be a specific administrator that does not share the values of shared-governance, although, that’s beyond the scope of this project to speculate on what his motivation is. There is a lot of negativity because of the way the school is currently managed. The direction I would like to go is twofold — to give the faculty a voice and to present another perspective.
Module 4 Lab: Ideate Part 2
Citations — how to incorporate into forum
Getting everyone’s permission — ask then think of a stategy for those that are hesitant
What kind of other project? Reflection? Research? My contribution?
Do I need research to get their interest?
(I needed to do my brainstorming session with my colleagues before our spring break. So this part of the brainstorming is a result of the information I got there.)
Is there a point to a forum? Does it have any use?
Connection?
Difficulty of dealing with my emotional reaction to the criticism. Do I even want to follow-through?
Do I want to include Jeremy? Is his attitude something I want included in the project?
Def see a fear, anxiety about contributing to the project. I need to address that.
Show some research. Ease their pain — ha, ha. (We work just outside of the Field of Dreams.)
Research — connection, toxic work environments, sharing stories.
Evidence.
Addendum
- I didn’t get a lot out of this. I have been thinking/working on this for the past two days. I need a longer break from it.
- This is how I naturally work — and why I hate group projects. I’m one of the minority that likes to start working on something right away. The result is that I have lots of creative bursts. This process actually reminds me of a conflict the faculty had with the administration— which I think they’ve give up on, but who knows, they may pick it up again — where the administration wanted us to work office hours 9–5. One of our arguments was that as instructors a lot of our work happens when we’re exercising, washing the dishes, walking the dog. It doesn’t happen within prescribed hours. I unintentionally plan lessons while I’m doing other things. So what happens with the many hours outside of being at school that I work?
Module 4 Problem of Practice: Ideate Part 1
Module 4 Problem of Practice: Ideate Part 2
Module 4 Problem of Practice: Ideate Part 3
The more involved I get in this project the more confused I get. The more I learn the less sure I feel about what I want to do. I had wanted to do a forum, but the kind of forum I want to do probably won’t serve the situation. People are too afraid, and too resistant to get as deep as they would need to to get the full power of connection from the forum. I might try to just write that paper — adding anonymous pieces from the contributions that answered the question of what is it like to work in a toxic environment. Then again, I think they just are so needing any positivity that any suggestion they just soak up. I took Alicia’s advice and organized a dinner outing that was well received. The result is that I’m less and less committed to what to do.
On a related note, I lost my job yesterday, or I was told they’re not renewing my contract. They can’t outright fire me because there is nothing wrong with my job performance. I wasn’t given any reason — because they can’t give the real reason, which is that I speak out against their behavior.
Module 5 Lab: Prototype
This is the mandala that I created from the ingredients in my cupboard. I was trying to create something related to the idea of beauty. The traditional mandalas that the monks make to exemplify the idea of impermanence are amazing. The hardest part was coming with an idea that inspired me. Once I had the idea that I could create with salt, baking soda and spices it all came together for me. However, this is WAY harder than it looks.
Module 5 Problem of Practice: Prototype
While I was in the Empathy stage I asked my colleagues to create something from within their disciplines that describes what it’s like to work in our toxic work environment. I was blown away by the feedback that I got. So much of it was raw and brutally honest about how it feels to work at our school. It seemed completely obvious to me that they needed to share their stories. At the same time, reading I was doing on my own was leading me to this exact same conclusion. Both Brene Brown and Tara Brach both write about the power of relationships to heal. As a result, I wanted to create a safe place where we could share our difficulties and challenges with each other. I chose to do this in the format of a forum.
Module 6 Lab: Testing
This video describes, in short, the forum I created to help myself, and the people I work with, deal with working in a toxic environment. I asked each person to describe what it is like, from within their disciplines, to work with our current administration. My intention is to help us to support each other emotionally in a situation where we have little to no control. Here is the result of the creation of the forum.
Module 6 Problem of Practice: Testing
Testing my forum was a long involved process that I luckily front-loaded; so much of the work had already been done. Once I started to get feedback during the Empathy phase, I continued to pursue asking my colleagues for feedback. I went around to all of my coworkers that were involved and spoke to them or asked for a written contribution. Several gave me something that was hand-written, which needed to be typed.
The next part was creating the forum. I knew I wanted a basic forum with threads for each discipline’s contributions. I easily found a free site. For a basic site it was surprisingly complicated to create. Finding a template that had an appropriate style was time consuming. Then I had to create each thread and upload all the submissions. It was fun but took a lot of time.
The actual testing was more thoughtful and deliberate than it was work intensive. After all the feedback I got during the Ideation phase I needed to be very cautious about how I wanted to approach the testing. For anyone to share they would have to trust the people they would share with. And even within our ranks there was a large amount of fear and mistrust. The trust issues didn’t originate with ourselves, but had leaked into our circle from the bad blood created by the administration.
Whatever the origin, I still needed to be intentional about who I matched with whom. My first thought was to approach the people who expressed the least amount of healthy paranoia from within our department. Person 1 had already given me permission, but I still double-checked with her to be sure. Then I had to tell her whom I would share her contribution with — person 2 and 3 — and she oked them. When I spoke with person number 2, she wanted me to write out, and sign, a confidentiality agreement detailing exactly how I was going to use her contribution. This seemed ridiculous to me, and I just chose not to include her in the testing. Person number 3 was willing to share his contribution with person 1, and so I used him for the testing.
Then I had to figure out if I was going to give number 1 and 2 their own login information, so I could test the ease of joining the forum. I closed all the threads not included in our department and thought about removing contributions I had already posted. However, I decided that if people had their own logins, it was too easy for accidents to happen. I decided that I wasn’t really testing login use but the forum itself anyway.
Once I figured out how to coordinate the testing, the rest went smoothly. I logged number 3 in, showed him the different threads, showed him number 1’s thread, which he read. I pointed out how to reply to a thread, and he did that as well.
I asked if it was easy to use. He said even as a person that as not that familiar with technology, he found it easy to use. I also asked if he would change anything, which he said he wouldn’t. He mentioned that he did not necessarily find the research section helpful. He doesn’t always find this type of information applicable and often even finds often it discouraging.
Problem of Practice Final Report
Brainstorming Ideas
There was a lot of challenge in choosing a Problem of Practice because of the obstacles and difficulty of the topic I was really interested in. I wanted to look more closely at the challenges involved in being in a toxic work environment. What it came down to is that this issue is all encompassing not just in my work but in personal life as well, and that was something I needed to look at.
Step 1: Empathy
This is where my project of practice really took on a life of it’s own. I really feel like asking my colleagues for feedback from the perspective of their disciplines was inspired. These are people that are experts in their fields. There aren’t many professionals that know more about their subjects than professors do. I think it must be a major part of who they are as people. So what better way is there than to have feedback informed from their realm of expertise?
Explaining my project, asking my colleagues for contributions and receiving the feedback was inspiring, and the feedback spoke for itself. I got some thoughtful and creative contributions about what it’s like to have the conflicts we do at work.
People were deeply affected by the negative atmosphere that we are working in. (I spoke to all the faculty except for three people who agree with the administration about how they manage the school. These are people that had all been promoted to department heads and given raises.) So, I spoke to all of the other thirteen faculty members, and they were all negatively affected by our work environment. Most were angry, many were feeling victimized and several were feeling some sadness or even depression because of the dysfunctional work environment.
However, they seemed to appreciate having someone listen to them. Nobody in administration was doing that, so I took the opportunity. This lead right into what seemed like a wide–open opportunity to help — not necessarily to change the situation with administration but to help my colleagues deal better with the emotional stress a toxic workplace. I felt like they wanted to be heard and creating a forum seemed like a good way to do that. What also came out of this was that I learned that the connectedness I have with my project comes from the relationships I develop with the people I’m designing for. This is what motivates me. Initiating change for the benefit of the people I care about.
Step 2: Define
Much of this aspect of the design process had already been constructed in the Empathy phase. In my school the relationship between the faculty and administration had broken down. There was an abuse of power on the side of administration.
However, it was not in my power to change this situation, but I did feel like I could improve the emotional side of being in a highly stressful environment. The faculty wanted to know someone cared — which nobody in a position to make changes seemed to — and they also needed to be heard. That was to be the focus of my project.
Step 3: Ideate
This was the other design stage that most informed my project. I gathered three colleagues to brainstorm ideas for a forum. It did not go well. We didn’t even get to the forum idea. They thought it was an opportunity to give me feedback about using a forum at all. It felt harsh and like they were using their intellect to put me down. This was an emotional stage for me.
In some ways I can understand this. They have no one to vent to, so even if it’s not the right situation, it is a chance to vent. It’s a chance to take out all their aggressions. (Truly only one person was being unhelp. He walked in with sunglasses on and a bad attitude — cliché but true. But because his feedback hurt the most, it’s what stood out to me.)
I did learn though, that people are rightfully paranoid and afraid of losing their jobs. (Prophetic in a weird way as I would later come to learn.) It was a real fear. Someone had already been fired and more would in the future as well. So, I had to take that information and apply it to how I would present my project. What I took away from this was to be very, very cautious. I noted here how much refining goes into the process and that that doesn’t necessarily mean failure.
Step 4: Prototype
Here I chose to work on a forum for the purpose of allowing my colleagues to support each other emotionally through the difficulties of being in a toxic work environment. This was one of the more fun stages of the process. I like playing with technology and that what I did in creating a forum. I looked at the different aspects of design and had to think about how I wanted to organize it.
This is also where I needed to do the most amending. I needed to construct the forum in a way that it was only accessible to those of us involved. I needed to remember that people could lose their jobs over this. This was hard because it’s not how I would have chosen to proceed.
Step 5: Testing
This was the easiest step in the process. The biggest obstacle here was trying to figure out how to test something where nobody wanted to share their work. I decided not to have them create their own account, but rather to use mine, so I had complete control. And I did find two people willing to share with each other. It tested well overall.
Concluding Thoughts
This was an emotional process because the topic involved me so personally. Those were the hardest parts — getting my work rejected — and the most rewarding — developing deeper relationships with my colleagues. And I think it would have been a lot easier to have had a less impactful project for the first time around, but I did chose something that mattered to me, and that’s important.
I also think I learned a lot about success and failure. An essential part of who I am is getting out there and trying. Like the song says, “Trying is hard that’s why most people don’t do it.” And I find that I really value that in myself.
Final Reflection Paper
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
This project is dedicated to you. Of course I’ve been affected by the way that this school is managed, but I am less attached to this school than many of you who have devoted your lives to being the kind of instructors that these students need. However, what motivates me mostly is that I see other people being treated badly, and it is totally against my nature to look the other way and do nothing when I see this happening.
For my class called Learning Tech through Design, I was required to choose a “Problem of Practice.” This is an obstacle I have in my work that interests me and that will improve the quality of my work in some way however out in the periphery it might be.
I did know I wasn’t going to make any major changes at this school — the Church doesn’t even seem to be able to do that. However, because of this, I chose to focus on something I think I might have some effect on, which is to lessening the stress, frustration and tension among us.
The class follows the Stanford design framework and the first step in the process is Empathy. I wanted to know what it’s like for you to work in this environment. I thought it would be ideal to ask you this from within the perspective of your disciplines.
After I received your contributions, several things happened. First, I was amazed that you all were so deeply affected by the stress and negativity of working here. Second, I was so impressed with the contributions that I was often left speechless. Third, I strongly sensed that you wanted to be heard. And this impression was not subtle — I got this message loud and clear.
“All the lies, false hopes, reverses.” I like that when you consider our administration. Some of the reverses are very ironic considering the poor grammar, the contradictory nature of the changes, and the disastrous results.
At the same time, but not at all related to my school project, I kept coming across research that pointed out the power of relationships to heal. And by heal I mean challenges as strong as addiction — if you’re not convinced of this then just wait, I’ve got some research coming up. And again and again, in readings I ran across online, or in the books I was reading on my own, I found the strength of coming together as a key way to overcome difficult and painful situations.
However, it didn’t all come together as I would have liked. There were obstacles, and I already knew I would have to be really sensitive about how I approached the project. After my brainstorming session about the possibility of utilizing a forum with a few volunteers within our ranks, it became clear to me that we are understandably concerned about the safety of our jobs. Lack of trust came up repeatedly and enthusiastically. Mistrust was not exclusively reserved for the administration but to each other was well. Intentionally sharing with others was not the problem but accidents do happen. And when accidents happen, layoffs happen, reprimands happen and even bullying happens. As much as that disrupts the vision I had for my project, I can’t disregard that because it is a serious, legitimate concern.
How do I feel? Outraged, insulted, sidelined, silenced, gutted, pointless, not valued, ignore, made irrelevant, feared. I feel –clearly — fragmented. I am taken out of myself. I don’t know who I am. I am not recognized for my virtues. I am defined by a story others need to tell about me to assuage their fears, staunch their responsibilities, and shore up what passes for their manhood. Excuse me; I should say, “what passes for their humanity.”
My initial thought was to create a forum where we could gain strength from sharing our stories with each other. And the forum was intended to protect us. It couldn’t be seen by outside eyes. Only those with my permission would be allowed to view it, but it would still out there. It’d be written down somewhere that you don’t have complete control of.
My solution to this is to write an essay that integrates very anonymous pieces throughout this writing, although that does not have anywhere near the effect that I had originally planned. My idea was that the sharing of our stories is a proactive, healing experience. As I mentioned before, there is strength in the relationships we have with each other. Bearing our souls — at least to the extent that we can talk about our difficulties with work — has power. And again, one of our biggest obstacles is that no one is listening, the people in charge don’t care — we are not being heard.
I wanted to provide a forum for taking action, responding in a positive way and allowing us to be heard in a way that is meaningful to each one of us through our individual disciplines. But there are problems with this approach. At this point, I just can’t see any way to use a forum. We are too afraid for our jobs and too paranoid to allow such vulnerability to happen. I don’t blame anyone for that though, but it’s unfortunate that admin has even taken away a really effective coping technique for dealing with this situation.
[This] really tries to convey the idea that my general positive and hopeful disposition was diminished and nearly extinguished by the environment.
However, knowledge is power, and I wanted to share a little about what I found in my research. I so wanted to write a comprehensive document about the consequences and effects of working in an environment such as ours, as well as solutions to these problem. There is, unfortunately, a lot of information out there. This is unfortunately outside the scope of my project, but I did want to touch on a few themes that had the biggest impact on me.
Let’s look a little at toxic workplaces shall we? Do we really think we work in a toxic environment? I do. I always feel a little bit energetically and emotionally violated when I have an interaction with someone from the inner circle. Brené Brown (2015), a shame researcher, describes a negative workplace through the lens of shame:
Blaming, gossiping, favoritism, name-calling, and harassment are all behavior cues that shame has permeated a culture. A more obvious sign is when shame becomes an outright management tool. Is there evidence of people in leadership roles bullying others, criticizing subordinates in front of colleagues, delivering public reprimands, or setting up reward systems that intentionally belittle, shame, or humiliate people? (p. 189)
And the consequences of being in this type of environment are that, “Shame can only rise so far in any system before people disengage to protect themselves. When we’re disengaged, we don’t show up, we don’t contribute, and we stop caring” (p. 192). This may be where we were headed or have already arrived. Many people were afraid for their jobs and most, if not all, were scared to confront, on any level, this deteriorating situation.
I haven’t done exhaustive research on this topic. I learned, however, a few other interesting pieces of information that might inform the situation. Stalcup (2012) notes, “Studies show that professions that are particularly susceptible to mobbing [group bullying] include government, religious organizations and academics” (p. 1145). Good to know.
So how do I deal with this? I either read my e-mail as little as possible, or I use euphemisms to express what I mean (“challenging environment” in the title to this document; “hostile workplace” would be more accurate), and I might crack a joke now and then as a kind of defense mechanism. I write a bit too. Like this document. It’s cathartic, I suppose. I feel better anyway.
One concern I heard regarding this project was the question of whether there was value in sharing our experiences. Brene Brown says this, “The act of not discussing a traumatic event or confiding it to another person could be more damaging than the actual event. Conversely, when people shared their stories and experiences, their health improved, their doctor’s visits decreased, and they showed significant decreases in their stress hormones” (82). I thought all of this was common knowledge. The ultimate point of sharing our stories, however, is to create or strengthen our connections with each other.
Perhaps even more painfully and subtly are cases where I wondered what the proper response –and this has exercised my mind quite a lot in the last couple of months — what are my responsibilities to a friendship when they’ve been treated badly, and I think unjustly, and what I should do about that.
Personally, one of my biggest fears about doing this project was the reaction I was going to get from a group of highly intelligent academics. It was very likely the project would get just a little bit too kombaya for everyone and me and my work would be dismissed as touchy-feely and useless — this was exactly the response I got in my brainstorming session. If this is what you’re thinking then I’ve got a good response to that argument.
People need human connection. Human connection is healing. As a matter of fact, recent research indicates that the cause of drug addiction is isolation and a toxic environment, and the cure is human relationships. Hari notes a study based on allowing isolated rats to drink as much drug water as they want and those rats were compared to rats with friends in an ideal rat life (2015), “While all the rats who were alone and unhappy became heavy users, none of the rats who had a happy environment did.” He goes on to say, “The opposite of addiction is not sobriety. It is human connection.” If connection can cure drug addition can’t it help us as well, even a little, if not significantly?
Outside of the benefits of sharing our stories and building connections with each other — hold on there, this part leans heavily on optimism and hopefulness — we are all looking to feel more peace, ground and in control of our situation. We may have to really work at it, but there is hope here.
So I pray, though not very well. God is everywhere, I know. But what I know and what I feel are different, and my feeling is that God is keeping his distance from this place. I don’t want to lose my faith altogether, so I develop coping strategies. Strategy #1: Leave work immediately after class, as often as possible. Strategy # 2: Persistently look for signs of hope, for the Holy Spirit alive in people. They are there, in the midst of the turmoil:
1. Brother D, wearing blinking Christmas lights on his sweater for an ugly sweater contest.
2. Student E, headphones on, giggling uncontrollably as he watches a L/S video for the 5th time.
3. Student F, listening quietly to a story as I tell it, and then saying to me in a way that’s so pointed it makes me uncomfortable: “You are a blessing.”
And I still hear her words in my mind, and now they doesn’t sound so much like a compliment but a command.
This could be a much longer piece. There is an unsurprising amount of research out there about the experience of working in a toxic environment. However, there is also a massive amount of work out there — both research based and experientially based information — that describes the ability for us to help each other. We have a lot more control than we’re giving ourselves credit for. My only real intention here is to help everyone be more aware of this.
References
Brown, Brené. (2012). Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent and Lead. New York, NY: Penguin Group.
Hari, Johann. (2015). The Likely Cause of Addiction Has Been Discovered, and It Is Not What You Think. HuffPost. Retrieved from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/johann-hari/the-real-cause-of-addicti_b_6506936.html
Stalcup, Apryll M. (2012). Surviving toxic work environments. ABCS of Education and Professional Development in Analytic Science. 405, 1145–1147.
