The Present Professor Volume 3

Its hard to learn when youre under stress, and a lot harder when your teacher is struggling with stress, too. In a world where stress is unavoidablewhere political turmoil, pandemic fallout, and personal challenges touch everyonethis timely book offers much-needed guidance for cutting through the emotional static that can hold teachers back. A specialist in pedagogical strategies with extensive classroom experience, Elizabeth A. Norell explains how an educators presence, or authenticity, can be critical to creating transformational spaces for students. And presence, she argues, means uncovering and understanding ones own internal struggles and buried insecuritiesstresses often left unconfronted in an academic culture that values knowing over feeling. Presenting the research on how and why such inner work unlocks transformational learning, The Present Professor equips educators with the tools for crafting a more authentic presence in their teaching work. At a time of crisis in higher education, as teachers struggle to find new ways to relate to, think about, and instruct students, this book holds a key. Implementing more inclusive pedagogies, Norell suggests, requires sorting out our own identities. In short, if we want to create spaces where students have the confidence, comfort, and psychological safety to learn and grow, we have to create spaces where we do, too. The Present Professor is dedicated to that proposition, and to helping educators build that transformational space.