Surely You Understand...

I had stopped by T’s office unexpectedly, most likely to get a signature on graduate school paperwork or some other tedious hoop-jumping event. Before leaving, T told me about a recent department head’s retreat he had attended. He had found one session particularly thought-provoking, a session presented by an associate professor in the psychology department on the science of unconscious bias. She had shared the results of a variety of published studies providing evidence of the subtle gender biases that, even amongst the most progressive individuals, still play out in all facets of academia from mentoring, to hiring, to evaluation for promotion and tenure. He remarked on the results of one study regarding the evaluation of teaching by students. Apparently, one study had shown that students, independent of gender, tend to evaluate female instructors more harshly than their male counterparts. Although the study had not gone on to identify the cause of this difference, the authors provided multiple hypotheses to explain the phenomenon. For instance, women are more often associated with mothering or nurturing roles. Therefore, students are more likely to evaluate female instructors who “tow-the-line” with regard to grading policies more harshly because they are not fulfilling the expected role of nurturer. Whereas a male instructor with similar grading policies is more likely to be viewed as just “maintaining high standards” of his students.

I remember wondering if, as a student, similar unconscious biases had influenced my own evaluations of instructors. I also remember making a mental note to look the study up, to examine the research methodology, and possibly replicate the study in the sciences. But I quickly turned my attention back to my own research, and the arduous task of dissertation writing. It wasn’t until this semester, over 2 years later, that I really found myself thinking about this research again.

At the beginning of the semester, my body had not yet started to display to the world that I was pregnant. By the end of the semester, however, I was approaching my 32nd week and was clearly showing. My “baby bump” had become an explicit advertisement of motherhood. And coincidentally, I began receiving requests from my students that were… well, just different than what I had encountered the previous year teaching the same course. I first received an email from a graduate student enrolled in my course. He wrote to me, rather boldly, with a “proposal” as he called it. He explained to me that he had not been able to attend my class regularly because of his pregnant wife’s OB appointments. As there was a participation component to my course, he proposed that he be evaluated using a different grading scale that omitted participation. He felt this was a fair proposition, and noted that surely I would understand since I was also pregnant.

Another student emailed me after the final exam asking me to please consider the fact that she was a single mother when assigning her final grade. She was performing poorly prior to the exam, and was certain she had bombed the exam and as a result be on the border between a C and a D in the course. If she did not achieve a C she would be forced to retake the course, setting her back in her program an entire year. Surely I would understand how difficult it must be as a single mother? Couldn’t I make an exception?

It wasn’t that I had never been asked to “cut some slack” for one student or another. But these requests were more direct and tailored toward me as a mother-to-be. At first I was angry and unsure how to respond. I thought of all kinds of snide replies. Like replying to the graduate student by saying, “Actually, no, I do not understand. As you duly noted, I am pregnant. But I didn’t miss any classes due to my OB appointments.” Or to the single mother, “No, I couldn’t imagine how difficult it is to be a single mother. I only know what my own mother shared with me of her own experiences as a single mother, as she worked her way off of government assistance while supporting two small children.” Then I questioned whether or not I was being insensitive, after all, what if I had been in their shoes as a student? Anyone can have a bad semester. Should this one semester, this one course, really have that much impact on any one student’s future?

In the end, I denied their requests for special accommodations – I towed the line. Right or wrong, I applied the same evaluation criteria to these two students as I did to the other 248. But I haven’t stopped thinking about their requests, or rather, the rationale behind their requests. How, if at all, would their actions have been different if one of my male counterparts had been teaching instead? More importantly, does it even matter?