Evidence of bullying behavior is all around us. Last year, three incidents of this type of behavior happened in one week, and they all made national headlines: Kanye West charged the stage, stole the microphone at the VMA awards, and proceeded to tell the audience why he felt Beyonce should have won the award instead of the usurped Taylor Swift. Tennis player Serena Williams berated and threatened a line judge at the U. S. Open because of what she felt was a bad call. Lastly, and while not bullying in the strictest sense, South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson shouted out “You lie!” during a speech President Barack Obama gave to the joint session of Congress.
Other cases of bullying behavior are not quite as public, but they are, perhaps, more common. On the sidelines of an Under-6 boys and girls’ soccer game (kindergartners), parents yell and scream obscenities at the teenage referees about missed calls. At a local restaurant, patrons demean and criticize the server for not bringing them exactly what they want when they want it. In schools, children seem to be emulating their parents’ examples. If they don’t get what they want when they want it—even from their teachers—the children yell and scream, demean and criticize.
In Missouri, Lori Drews, a grown woman, used technology to bully Megan Meier, a teenage girl, and Meier committed suicide. Recently, a number of young people—teenagers—committed suicide after being bullied about their sexual orientation. Even in higher education, as reported in The Chronicle, workplace bullying appears to have caused one man’s death.
Bullying and abusive behavior is becoming all too common in our society, and it’s trickling down to our classrooms. ProfHacker’s “Disruptive Student” series takes on the bullies. We ask that you observe a few caveats, however:
- The first caveat: In this series, we will present a few scenarios, and it’s clear that how we handle these scenarios depends upon the discipline, the class size, and the culture of an institution. We try to include as many of these variables as we can, while understanding that we can’t account for every situational difference. What we are discussing here are behaviors that—no matter the discipline or the institutional culture—impede learning for other students.
- The second caveat: ProfHacker is not a place to complain about students. That is not what this series of posts attempts. Instead, we want to focus on what we can do, positively and professionally, to handle the sometimes-difficult situations we can have with students.
- Lastly, please don’t focus solely on the examples in each scenario. These are merely examples that I chose to use. I could have chosen to use others. The examples are only important in that they are controversial and cause the bully to emerge.
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Scenario #1: You are new professor, just a year or so out of graduate school, at a small liberal arts college with a diverse student population. You teach a small course (15-20 students) that is discussion-based. You assess student learning by quizzes, essays, and journal submissions. One of these students is a retired police officer, Bill, who “encourages” his classmates to give him their study notes so, as he puts it, “we can all be on the same page.” You sense he intimidates the other students—by his former profession, which he speaks about frequently, but also his size and demeanor—but they hand over their notes. You ask your department chair how to handle the situation. Your chair says to ignore the case, as the “students need to learn to handle these situations.” You feel conflicted. What do you do?
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Scenario #2: You are an experienced educator at a regional state university where the student population is not very diverse. You are teaching a large class (over 50 students). You expect a lot of conversation, movement, and collaboration among all students, as this is a hands-on course. In fact, you strive to group and regroup students at each class session, so they are frequently working with new people. However, you notice that a small group of men and women—the Busy Bees—dominate class-wide discussion and they refuse to participate in collaborative work that is not conducted with their friends. Additionally, when students outside this group are speaking to the entire class, those inside the group will interrupt the speakers, laugh loudly at something not relevant to the on-going conversation, or they will talk to one another, thereby ignoring the speaker completely. Several students have complained about the intimidation and the lack of respect they feel around the “inside group.” You ask the “Busy Bees” to recognize how they are coming across to their peers, and how they might consider modifying their behavior. The Busy Bees demand that you provide them with names and exact complaints so they can corroborate your assessment, as they feel they have been “giving” to those who are not as fortunate as they are. What do you do?
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Scenario #3: You are an untenured faculty member in a mid-sized department that is, for the most part, very collegial and polite. Your university has a solid reputation, but it is not a ranked, nationally known institution. You are proud of where you work. Your colleagues like you, and you like them. Recently, however, you have noticed a trend in hallway conversations and in social gatherings. Your colleagues criticize a faculty member who is not like them in many ways. This criticism ranges from comments about this person’s terminal degree (as it’s not from a top-ranked institution), the types of research this person does (it’s not like the research done by others in the department), and your colleagues even criticize the types of clothing this person wears. You want to ignore the criticism as it seems petty, but then you realize that your colleagues are “circling the tenure wagons.” Your criticized colleague is not involved in department decisions, is not included in department social events, and is, in some ways, being held to a much higher standard than the tenured faculty were held to. You think your criticized colleague is a wonderful teacher and scholar, and is being treated unfairly by the rest of the department. However, you don’t have tenure. What do you do?
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OK. Now it’s your turn. What would you do about the bullying in the above scenarios? What other suggestions do you have? Please leave comments below.
[Image by Flickr user Bill Dolak and used under the Creative Commons license.]
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9 Responses to Disruptive Student Behavior: The Bullies
phdyogi - November 2, 2010 at 9:31 am
I teach acting classes which are wholly hands-on and collaborative, though not as large as the class in Scenario 2. It’s a challenge to keep the classes from getting clique-y, as students are already intimidated by having to act in front of their peers (most of them have little to no experience). On the first day of class, when we talk about the syllabus, I explain that I see the syllabus as a contract between all of us, and point them to a section on expectations of both students and instructor in this course. One of the expectations for the students is the following: “all participants in this class are required to help promote and maintain a positive atmosphere in which everyone displays and receives respect, tolerance, and encouragement.” I then point out that participation is a large part of their grade, and points are deducted for modes of participation that do not support a positive atmosphere. While the phrase “positive atmosphere” is a bit more vague than I’d like, I find this brief statement in the syllabus helps me when I do need to address situations like Scenario 2, and allows me to remind them that their behavior not only affects class morale but, in fact, affects their grade.
delaneykirk - November 2, 2010 at 1:08 pm
I find it useful to assign teams (and even to rearrange the teams at the midterm) and require the teams to sit together, making sure that I break up the cliques when doing so.
kateclancy - November 2, 2010 at 2:04 pm
Scenario #1: I would ask the student to see me after class, and ask him why he wants other students’ notes. I’d like to figure out what is going on and see if it’s coming out of a place of insecurity, and whether there is something I can do to help with that. If the student is intractable I would then simply tell him he’d need to stop. I do actually think it’s the professor’s place to help the other students in that situation.
I feel pretty similarly about scenarios #2 and #3 — that there is a role to play of mediating, or even leading, in order to end bullying behavior.
But here’s where I get stuck. I teach a class of 700. My students are largely anonymous to me and that anonymity allows for some incivil, and sometimes even indirect bullying, behavior. On a lecture that covered possible biological mechanisms for variation in sexuality (including homosexuality), I had a student approach me after class, very upset, and tell me about the several young men behind him/her who were making fun of the lecture the whole time, and cracking gay jokes. I didn’t know about it during class. I didn’t know who these students were. I had no idea how to address the situation in order to interrupt homophobic behavior.
I wrote about it on my class blog, and have created some higher stakes carrots and sticks to reduce classroom talking. So far, so good. But I am still uncomfortable about how effectively, especially in the teaching of sensitive topics in very large classes, I can reduce the oppression of some of my students. I’d love to hear the thinking of others on this.
laur2582 - November 2, 2010 at 4:32 pm
Scenario #1: Make a generalized announcement to the class that sharing notes may be necessary if a student misses class, but otherwise, each student is responsible for her/his own notes. Emphasize that collaborative learning actually requires different perspectives on the same material, since each student learns and observes differently.
Scenario #2: When the BBs are actively disrupting class and discussion, I would stop the discussion entirely and ask them either to be quiet and respectful of the others or to leave the room. I have done this a number of times, in fact. I do not tolerate that kind of rude behavior in any circumstance. In addition, if they refuse to work with other students, I would make sure that it affects their grades. I would work into the syllabus some sort of language requiring students to interact with a majority of students in the class.
#3 has also happened to me, and I did not receive tenure as a result of not fitting into the culture of the college. I have taught at a number of institutions, and have discovered that I always love and enjoy my students, wherever I am, but have had problems with colleagues at one institution. I decided early on that if I was risking tenure by speaking up in unpopular ways, then that was not an institution where I belonged. I stayed through the negative tenure decision, floated for two years while deciding if I wanted to continue in academia, thinking that perhaps all schools had similar unpleasant politics. Happily, I decided to continue and am now in a position where, although there are problems at time with the administration and faculty, by and large it is collegial and a good place to work. I think the tightened market in academia has led people to think that they must stay where they are or they are never going to get another job. I think that keeping one’s mouth shut at the expense of one’s peace of mind is always a mistake.
11196496 - November 2, 2010 at 5:24 pm
Scenario #1: Adult student who wants everybody’s notes–I agree with kateclancy. Older students seem to need at least one or two meetings with professors, especially in their first semester or two, to recieve some validation of their status as mature persons (re)entering the undergraduate world of, in their view perhaps, immature persons. This is especially so if they have not been able to find a social or study group among the younger students. Often engaging them in conversation one-on-one early in the semester helps tremendously. It feeds the student’s ego and obviates some otherwise obnoxious behavior.
Scenario #2 Busy Bees–People who converse in class–outside of the general class discussion– or read non-class materials are a distraction to me and my students. Whether it is a small or large lecture class (150+), I handle it the same way. I gradually slow down speaking and focus my gaze on the offenders. If possible, I walk in their direction. In a short while, the entire class is focusing on them. If necessary, I just slow down speaking until I stop. The combination of my stopping and all the other students staring is usually enough to embarrass the offenders. I have never had a repeat performance by the same students, but I have had after-class apologies.
For discussion sections, I address the offender(s) and say something to the effect, “I’m sorry. We couldn’t hear your contribution to the discussion. Please repeat.” Again this is usually enough to take care of the situation for the rest of the semester.
I guess I have taught at schools with polite students or students whose shame threshold is pretty low.
kantopet - November 3, 2010 at 7:56 am
Scenario #1: An interesting solution I have seen for this, which I have seen used in large introductory lecture classes is that students have to hand in their lecture notes, which must be hand-written, and will be graded on them. The purpose of this was to teach some basic study skills and to break students away from their computers. If I recall correctly, it factored in as something like 25% of the final grade as well. Next time I am stuck in a large lecture hall with enough TAs (okay, that’s meant as a joke), I may consider such an attack myself.
Scenario 2: I have to say, I have a small sadistic streak when it comes to students who don’t pay attention because they feel the need to chat. My syllabus even says “I reserve the right to make fun of people who aren’t paying attention in class, so if you wonder why everyone is looking your way and laughing … they’re laughing at you.” I follow up on that threat a few times and students fall in line. Not as effective in large lecture halls where students feel anonymous. There the only option tends to be to stop class, suggest perhaps that the student in question really wants to be in the campus center and not a lecture hall, and point out that next time it won’t be a suggestion. Most such students aren’t being intentionally disrespectful, they are being oblivious. The danger of being kicked out of the classroom is an effective deterrent (especially if you give quick pop quizzes at the end of many sessions). In a pinch, and in a large class, a police whistle works well too, especially if you pull it out slowly so all the students who are paying attention are braced for it when it comes.
11126724 - November 3, 2010 at 1:59 pm
Scenario #1: I actually encourage students to “compare notes” outside class on the “two heads are better than one” thesis, suggesting that what one misses another may get. I do an “ice-breaker” exercise first day in my intro class, and then ask each student to introduce another one to the class. But I also insist that every student have some notes to compare with the others. This just sounds like a lazy student who doesn’t wish to take his own notes, and relies on others to do it for him. That can’t be tolerated because it will deter attendance of others. For older students, of which I see many, I find most are insecure about their status in the class, and the introductions provide a way to establish their experiential credentials. Keep in mind that former law enforcement officers tend to have authoritarian personalities, and have been trained to dominate situations. Sometimes they need to be “talked down” in private to make them realize they are welcome in the class and can learn from younger people around them.
Scenarios #2: I state in my syllabi that talking when somebody else is speaking is rude, and will not be tolerated. Same with getting up and leaving the class. Most students were not socialized as older generations were about these issues, even in school, and are simply ignorant about social norms, so must be informed about them. I find it I put them on notice early, this behavior is minimized, and if it continues, I ask them if they would like to teach the class. That usually is a stopper.
Scenario #3: There is no antidote for bad-mouthing as effective as good-mouthing.
snwiedmann - November 3, 2010 at 3:35 pm
Scenario #2: I would tell the “Busy Bees” that their behavior disturbed ME because it was disruptive and disrespectful. I would break up their group by relocating them and assigning each to a different discussion/project group. If they complained, I would point out that it was my course — not theirs — and direct them to my supervisor.
mdcarstarphen - November 7, 2010 at 12:40 am
I might have missed a between-the-line, so to speak, but no one mentioned the possibility of creatively incorporating said disruptions into the class discussion. I’ve sometimes had much success with that approach in both U.S. classrooms and, now, in China (where I went to teach after failing my PhD prelims at Texas A&M University). Even when such fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants efforts sometimes fall flat, the effort itself is what serves to build an understanding of what it actually is “to do” innovative teaching. It sometimes happens that such efforts are recognized, picked up, and further developed by one or more of the astute students who ARE paying attention to the whole process.
Just a suggestion. . .