热点大瓜

Maggie Grady: 0:03

Welcome to the CATT Teaching Table podcast, where we dive into the art and science of teaching, learning and technology. Hosted by the University at Buffalo's Office of Curriculum, Assessment and Teaching Transformation, otherwise known as CATT, and supported Genteels' Excellence in Teaching Fund, this podcast is dedicated to highlighting the journeys toward educational excellence. I'm Maggie Grady, a learning designer here in CATT, and today we're tackling a topic that is close to home for many educators avoiding teacher burnout. Joining us today is Dr Aisha O'Malley, a professor at the School of Management, who not only experienced burnout herself at the five or six year mark, I should say, for her example and talk about her teaching journey but also successfully reinvented her teaching strategy by diving into the world of artificial intelligence, which we're all super fascinated by in today's world. So thank you, Dr. O'Mally, for joining us today and sharing your journey, your insights, your strategies that helped you avoid the burnout and reignite your passion for teaching.

Dr. Aisha O'Mally: 1:08

I am so happy to be here, Maggie. I love you, I love what you guys are doing, so thank you for inviting me to participate in this pretty cool podcast.

Maggie Grady: 1:18

So, as an educator and someone whose job is to help teachers, that's me, I wanted to understand more about what burnout really is. So what I learned was that burnout is more than just a feeling of being tired after a long week. Burnout is a state of emotional, physical and mental exhaustion caused by prolonged stress, and it's especially prevalent in professions that involve high levels of interpersonal interaction, like teaching. So burnout can sneak up on you, turning something that you once loved into a source of dread. When we all have that, we know that it's time to reevaluate. So it's a serious issue that can affect your health, your teaching and your overall well-being. So this is all the things that I learned, and a lot of it is like yeah, that's kind of everyday life, so can you share what it looked like for you and what led to it in your experiences?

Dr. Aisha O'Mally: 2:12

So I teach our business communication courses and I've been teaching them since 2017. While I was dissertating, I taught six sections and then I was hired full time and I teach that and I'm contracted to teach four of those classes fall and spring and so I was doing that for about a good five years and then, you know, with anything you get a little bored. You're like I want something new and so I started taking on new classes, right, which required new prep. And so by year six, I had started taking on new courses on top of my four sections per semester. But I was excited, right, because I was teaching two new classes that I was passionate about, that I wanted to get you know, revel and dig into with my students, and so I took it on with gusto. And then by week nine, I was exhausted. Because, while my CL2 classes can run pretty smoothly, because I've taught that for five years, the new preps I was creating on the fly and kind of adjusting on the fly as well, and so it required a lot of cognitive work, right, creative work and sitting in front of larger classrooms with more eyes on me with I felt like more expectation, and it just started feeling daunting.

I was like the week would be so long for me, and so on the weekends I couldn't catch up on sleep. I couldn't, I couldn't. I didn't feel rejuvenated after the weekend because I was also using the weekend to work, to like grade and to prep for the new week coming in and making adjustments based on what was happening in the prior week. And so I found that not only was I exhausted, but because I was so exhausted mentally and physically, it was hard for me to connect with my students. Right? Now, they're exhausted for a whole nother reason, right, but they're also exhausted, and so it was just me. I just need to get through this next class, I just need to get through this next class.

And by week nine I had hit a wall and I didn't have time to regroup and reassess. After week nine I was like, okay, I got six more weeks, we just got to make it to six more weeks. And so each week it was just like okay, we got through that, all right. Next week and I just felt like I was getting even more tired. I felt even more pressure from wanting to be a good professor and realizing that I wasn't being a good professor in my mind and then thinking and watching my students not connecting and I'm just like god and like you said, this is a chore. It is no longer a love, it is a chore.

And so the lack of connection with my students, the lack of enough sleep, I wasn't eating well, I wasn't working out like I normally do to relieve that stress. So, because I didn't have enough time to relieve that stress, it was building up so by week 15, I was done. I was so done. And I mean I barely got through week 15 and I was just like, listen, turn what you need to turn in, I don't care, we will, I will deal with it, I will manage it, but we are done here, right, and I hated the way that I ended that semester. I just felt like, wow, that's not what I'm about and that's that's not who I want to continue to be.

But I really didn't get a chance to dig in to change how I handled burnout until the summer, because we get four weeks off. People are like, oh, you get four weeks off, all you're doing is just, you know, sitting at home and watching Netflix and popping popcorn. And no, I'm prepping for the spring semester and I had a new prep for the spring semester, right, and so, and coming off of a very hard semester, I only gave myself probably like a week, maybe a week and a half, to really decompress. But I didn't give myself enough time to reevaluate, right. It was just like, ok, let's just get our senses back. Let's just get back to a good, normal place. And then it was like, all right, we got three more weeks to like, let's get this started, I need to make sure my weeks are together. So it just.

I just never had enough time to catch up and it went from one semester into the next, and the next semester was another new prep. And this new prep I was not ready for. I thought it was and I wasn't. And so when classes hit and it was a really new class for me, I was again in that cycle of creating week to week and adjusting week to week, and then seeing the disappointment that on my students faces, like what are you talking about? Like this isn't, and then not being able to have the energy to energize them about what I was talking about. So for me. Burnout was just exhaustion, was mentally not being able to be creative, not being able to connect with my students and not seeing myself in that positive way that I used to see myself as someone who can make an impact, someone who is here for the students. I'm here to support you whatever you need, and I didn't have it in me to do that.

Maggie Grady: 8:03

So one of the things that I found super impressive about you is that your passion for teaching. And then you were telling me this story and I'm thinking there has to be so many other educators out there that are feeling this exact same thing, so let's tell the story. So how did you overcome it? What helped you with getting that sense of you know I am a good educator because you are. It's just you just didn't have the time to do whatever. So how did you overcome that?

Dr. Aisha O'Mally: 8:32

I had to stop and really self-evaluate and reflect on the type of professor I wanted to be. I am passionate about teaching and I want to be good at it. Right, and so it was okay. What's going to make me a better professor? What is going to make me mentally stable? What is going to relieve some of this stress, and what type of support do I need? So what I decided to do was I got a coach who works in higher education, right, so she knows the cycle of higher ed.

Because I needed to step out of myself, because we are so much in our own heads and our own worst enemy, right, we are so judgmental of ourselves. And that's exactly what burnout was. And she allowed me to incorporate some self-reflection pieces. And I am an I am a consummate communicator, so I don't write, I don't. I've always tried to journal, but I'm not. I don't like the art of writing, um, like handwriting, and but I, I talk through, that's how I think is talking. And so she gave me the space to be reflective using my voice and thinking. So the coach was tremendous in me taking a step out of myself and having someone neutral saying you know, you're not, you're not so bad. Right, it's okay what you're going through and you're not the only one right, because, of course, when we're in that stressful mindset, we think we're the only ones right and we generally don't ask for help because we're just trying to survive, right. So the coach was super helpful. Then I also said to myself what will make me a better professor? Professional development. So I signed up for an AI NYU course at their professional services portion of their university, where they offer this AI and communication course. I really want to know more about AI because you know that is like the buzzword. Everybody is talking about AI and I knew I didn't know enough and I thought that maybe if I learned more about it it might help me in my classroom. I didn't know how, I just knew I needed to dive in and in July I went to that AI and communication.

It was in person, it's intensive, it's a two weeks, but I was so excited. I was excited to be a student again and what I did was I put myself in my students shoes. I had my laptop, I had my phone and I knew it was so challenging to get them away from that when I'm in the classroom to pay attention. I said, let me see how, how difficult is this, right? And so what I asked them to do is I asked them to put it on mute and put it in their book bag, not to keep it on themselves, because even that's distracting. So I did that and let me tell you, it was amazing

Being a student, I learned so much. I was able to focus because I was not being distracted by my phone, because we are addicted to these screens. I wanted to see can I sit and focus? Because it was from not, it was professor, right? in the morning to three. It's a long day and it was so reinvigorating.

I was around professionals from so many different industries, different countries. It was just reinvigorating and that gave me the juice to really say you know what. You got going to be better, we can be better and I can utilize AI to be a better professor. Right Certification allowed me to look at my students again in the way of, yeah, I don't have kids, they are my kids. You know I don't take on their parental role, but yeah, I'm here to guide you. who do you I want to be?

And that again reinvigorated me. It was like, oh, yeah, I can do this. I'm built for this right, so it just takes some time you got to take the time to sit down and reflect, to reflect on what went wrong, but not berating yourself, but from a learner perspective and then say, ok, now, what can we do to make it better? Right, right. And then, once you can figure out, what can I do to make it again then it's that you asked me how did I, what did I change? I realized that I wanted to teach, not just content, I wanted to teach the student, the whole student. I want my students to be better than when they came in, reflect, so when you, if you can be here and develop some self-awareness, some emotional intelligence, but also learn the content that you need to learn, I know they will be better students.

I'm having real conversations with them and I'm being very transparent with them, every decision that I make, the way I build the syllabus, the method to my madness. Why am I asking you to revise this? Is because it's a learning opportunity for you. I'm teaching them also how to do college, and that's what I think I forgot. Right, we assume they know. How do they know, how do they know High school is completely different, right, so it was. Again, I'm teaching to the full student. I'm understanding that they need more knowledge about self-confidence, emotional intelligence, how to be a better human being. So it's not just the content, because I'm more than that. The time that I took over the summer to reflect the coach that I got, the supervisor that I have that is open, the choices that I made to be more thoughtful and reflective really allowed me to reinvigorate the passion for teaching.

Maggie Grady: 14:39

Yeah, I do love all of those things that you mentioned. I love that you turned your negative experience into a positive and it sounds like, on the other side of it, you've come out, emerged, refreshed and fulfilled.

Dr. Aisha O'Mally: 14:55

I'm starting to feel fulfilled again. Yeah, I am bringing back that love for teaching, which I thought I didn't know how I was going to get it back. Yeah, but, but. I did, I didn't know how I was going to get it back, but I did and I'm grateful for it.

Maggie Grady: 15:04

Yeah, good, Okay, so let's go on a little bit changed your approach to work. Did it change you with your preparation? Do you think that it just stepped back and kind of you know, take it apart and fix it? How did you? .

Dr. Aisha O'Mally: 15:24

Yeah, semester, had to take it apart and fix it. How did you Wednesday Yeah Friday I had to. I had to take it apart, right, because I had to see. At first, I had to see what wasn't working for me and then what wasn't working for the students, and what I realized was the biggest thing was the lecture. And so, um, it was realizing, how can I find okay different ways for them to learn other than me talking at them? I was like overloading my classes with content and not thinking about the objective, which was to make my students better. I had to, like I said, see what wasn't working, take a step back and then also, why wasn't it working? Right? And asking ourselves the tough questions, right, and I have to say, I got lazy right, I did, I got lazy, I started well, I got lazy, I did, I got lazy, I started well. All I need to do is tell them about this, and they'll get it. No, and I should have known better. But again, maybe it wasn't lazy, maybe that wasn't the word, but again I was tired. And so we think we have to fill the class period with content and covering everything, but we don't.

This semester, I didn't touch the syllabus until Friday. I teach Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I didn't touch it till Friday. I wanted to get to know my students first, and so I started with introducing myself. And then we did a game two truths and a lie and we ran through the class and I, and we had a good time, right. And then the second day I focused on OK, some of some of my expectations and what I think the class would be, what the schedule would be. But I really didn't get into that and I got. I did another activity on Wednesday I had them hand write a elevator pitch.

Right, I gave him a short little slide on what to do. They wrote it. And then on Friday I told him to whip out their laptops and we're going to throw that and we're going to create a prompt in (Microsoft) Copilot. I said the prompt is I want you to say can you revise my elevator be just, more persuasive? And I said conversation. It see the suggestions, are you going to use everything? And I was. It was. I was so like happy, like immediately happy. They were like oh no, oh no. And I was like ... great And why not? And they're like well, it doesn't sound like me, like it is it sounds good dictating it doesn't sound. I'm like exactly.

Then, after that, then I went into the syllabus and then I only covered the parts of the syllabus that were to guide them, right, so I didn't talk about I mean, I talked about diversity in the classroom, what's acceptable and what's not, integrity in the classroom. I did talk about plagiarism, but I did. I just it was more like a. it was just like I'm going to tell you these are the things I have in the syllabus that are important because and just covering it in a way that is more around a conversation than is dictatorship right, dictating to them.

And so the next week then I was able to set even more expectations. So the building each week, I'm not throwing everything at them in the first class, letting them go early, really like let's build a relationship. Breaking it down and also just giving myself the time to be able to do that right.

Maggie Grady: 18:52

That wraps up part one of avoiding faculty burnout with Dr. Aisha O'Malley from the UB School of Management. Please join us next time for part two of our conversation to learn how, with a right approach, burnout can be managed. And, as always, be sure to connect with us online at buffalo.edu/catt that's c-a-t-t or email us at ubcatt@buffalo.edu.