how to have difficult conversations in the classroom

About the 'difficult conversations' community of practice at UCSC 

Universities are increasingly acknowledging that critical current events—whether local, national, or global in scope—can evoke anxiety, fear, anger, and grief amongst community members, leading to significant and adverse impacts on teaching and learning. Critical events occur within a larger context of racialized violence in the US and globally, alongside white supremacy within academia. This can create an environment that is hostile to empathy and reflexivity, as students are unlikely to trust one another, let alone the institution, to support their wellbeing. 

Meanwhile, evidence suggests that students can thrive when teaching teams acknowledge or discuss traumatic events—recognizing that learning happens in the context of lived experiences, both historical and contemporary.  Yet teachers often feel ill-equipped to facilitate such conversations and may sidestep sensitive topics to avoid inflaming tensions in the classroom. 

Responding to this need, in my role as Associate Dean of DEI for the Social Sciences Division, I invited graduate student workers and lecturers to apply for small grants to put these "difficult conversations" strategies in to practice. I partnered with our Teaching and Learning Center (TLC), which had recently developed a guide for classroom discussions on politically and culturally sensitive topics. This guide offers strategies for establishing and sustaining an inclusive learning community that supports students during times of crisis—while simultaneously attending to instructors’ and TAs’ wellbeing.

In Fall 2024, I put out a call for applications and in Winter 2025, we formed a community of practice composed of 11 TAs and lecturers in the Social Sciences Division and Writing Program. All participants taught courses either in person, virtually, or asynchronously in Winter, Spring, and/or Summer 2025. We spanned the departments of Economics, Psychology, Environmental Studies, Education, and the Writing Program. We also spanned levels of experience, ranging from graduate students at the start of their pedagogy careers to lecturers who have been teaching for nearly two decades. We shared the desire to experiment with, document, and share methods for holding "difficult conversations" in our classroom spaces. We were also curious: What makes a conversation difficult in the first place? Why is it hard and for whom?

Our project could not have been more timely. In the US, Trump had just come into the president's office, unfurling actions designed to target DEI and weaken universities' support for critical thinking and intellectual inquiry. Researchers saw grants terminated by the NIH, NEH, NSF, USDA, and NASA; LGBTQIA+ rights came under attack, and ICE raids terrorized our immigrant and international student communities.  Meanwhile, Palestine/Israel continued to occupy the attention of many students, faculty, and staff, their actions and words underscoring the key role a university can play in avoiding the conflation of discomfort with unsafety. Across campus, “real world” politics was reverberating through our lives. It was therefore an opening for this project to take root.  

This site is designed to share some of our experiences and lessons with the wider UCSC community.  You can explore participants' project pages here. You can review the theory that guides our approaches here.  

With much gratitude to Kendra Dority and Roxanna Villalobos of TLC for their collaboration in convening this space; to Amy Argenal (Teaching Professor, Sociology) and Cynthia Lewis (Professor emerita, Education) for their brainstorming during early stages of this project; and to all the participants of our learning community for your creativity and courage. Thank you.

~ Maywa Montenegro 

   Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion for the Division of Social Sciences

   Associate Professor, Environmental Studies, UCSC