| Students, Jedi Knights and the promise of civility
First of a three-part series on fostering civility in nursing education and practice.
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| By Cynthia Clark |
Some readers may know I am a professor in the School of Nursing at Boise State University and a fellow in both the American Academy of Nursing and the National League for Nursing’s Academy of Nursing Education. I am also the founder of Civility Matters.
For more than a decade, I have studied incivility in academic and
practice environments to develop evidence-based strategies to create and
sustain cultures of civility. Very often, I am asked how I got involved in this topic. Here’s my story.
 Before
I accepted my faculty position at the university, I worked for more
than a dozen years as a psychiatric nurse, specializing in adolescent
and family mental-health issues. I was blessed to be a member of a
hotshot crew of adolescent mental-health workers who treated teenagers
living with a variety of mental-health and substance-abuse disorders.
Many of our patients were gang members, adjudicated youth with a long
history of violence and addiction-related problems.
Using a primary prevention approach, we helped teenagers
settle disputes and disagreements with words and other nonviolent means,
instead of resorting to weapons and physical violence. We also
considered protective factors and resilience measures to equip our
patients with effective ways to deal with stress and to recover from
traumatic life events, including trauma resulting from exposure to
violence. My clinical work with aggressive and violent youth has fully
informed my program of research on preventing personal and
organizational violence and continues to fuel my passion for creating
communities of civility, not only on college campuses but everywhere.
Just me?
After leaving my clinical practice and assuming my role as a
university professor, things were fairly status quo—in the beginning.
Students seemed to focus on learning, and faculty, for the most part,
enjoyed teaching. However, in the early 2000s, I began to witness a
shift. I noticed attitudinal and behavioral changes in our nursing
students. Some of the changes were subtle, but they set off alarm bells
in my “gut,” because they reminded me of my earlier experiences with
angry youth. Although my college students weren’t outwardly hostile, I
noticed more and more rude and disruptive behaviors, and I wondered, “Is
it just me?” I also wondered if my observations were even accurate;
perhaps they were colored somewhat by my previous clinical work.
Armed with a probing and curious mind, I began my quest to
learn all I could about this troubling phenomenon. I started asking
other professors, reminiscent of a man- or woman-on-the-street
interview. I engaged in some very provocative conversations, and what I
discovered was fascinating. Several professors were witnessing
disruptive student behaviors, such as students consistently being late
for class, holding distracting side conversations, misusing cellphones,
challenging faculty knowledge and credibility, and making harassing and
demeaning comments. Some professors told me they were retiring or moving
on to other employment opportunities, because the toxic classroom
behavior and these uncivil encounters were psychologically and
physically impacting their lives.
“I know where you live!”
About the same time, two major events happened that forever
changed my life and set the course for my program of study on
incivility. One event involved a very angry nursing student who failed a
nursing course and, for some reason that still perplexes me, held me
responsible for the failure. Another faculty member had issued the
failing grade but, because I was the course coordinator, I had to make
the final decision about the grading outcome. I upheld the failure, but
the student grieved the grade.
My
clinical work … continues to fuel my passion for creating communities of
civility, not only on college campuses but everywhere.
Over
the course of the student’s attempts to appeal the failing grade, he
made personal threats that, to this very day, make my heart race. In his
anger and rage, he threatened me with statements such as, “You need to
change my grade to a passing grade because I know where you live, I know
where you park your car, and I know where your kids go to school.” It
was a terrifying experience and, in retrospect, after a decade has
passed, I see how far we’ve come in being able to deal with these
situations and prevent them from happening in the first place.
Fortunately, this situation was safely resolved, but it left me a bit
shell-shocked and questioning if I should stay in my faculty role.
The second event, which happened about the same time, was
much more chilling. It involved the killing of three university nursing
professors, two of whom were shot in cold blood in a large lecture hall
while students were taking their midterm exam. A third nursing professor
was later found dead in her office. The shooter, a disturbed nursing
student, was apparently enraged over being barred from the exam. After
killing the three professors, he turned the gun on himself and took his
own life. Prior to the killings, the shooter mailed a lengthy manifesto
to an area newspaper, detailing his plan to pull the trigger. I knew
then that I was on to something, and I began to study this very
important issue in earnest. Eventually, my interest extended beyond
student behaviors to include faculty incivility and our potential
contribution to this incivility problem.
My work encompasses student perceptions of academic
incivility and garners student opinions on ways to address and resolve
the problem. Incivility is an issue that, to some extent, all of us face
in American society. Whether it’s road rage, desk rage or just plain
rudeness, we are impacted by these behaviors. Incivility is an affront
to human dignity and an assault on a person’s intrinsic sense of
self-worth. The effects can be devastating and long-lasting. Exposure
to uncivil behaviors can result in physical symptoms, such as
headaches, interrupted sleep and intestinal problems. They can also
cause psychological conditions, including stress, anxiety, irritability
and depressive symptoms. Thus, it is important to raise awareness about
the importance of fostering a civil and healthy academic work
environment.
A little bit of cancer?
Sometimes, people make statements such as, “You know, Dr.
Clark, in our organization, incivility isn’t really a problem because
only one or two individuals are uncivil to or bully others.” Here’s my
response: “Imagine you are a patient sitting with your primary care
provider after undergoing a series of tests, and he or she says to you,
‘No worries. You are one of the lucky ones; you only have one or two
malignant cells circulating in your body.’” Yes, of course, this is a
ridiculous response, but I suggest to you that the same level of
absurdity relates to incivility in the workplace.
It is my fervent belief, and the evidence bears this out,
that one or two toxic employees can devastate an organization. For
example, Pearson and Porath (2009) report that managers and executives
of Fortune 1000 firms spend as much as 13 percent of their total work
time—seven full weeks per year—addressing problematic employee
relationships or replacing workers who leave the organization because of
incivility. The authors cite one example where a hospital spent more
than $25,000 dealing with just one uncivil episode.
The costs of incivility are vast. Uncivil behavior adds to
employer and employee stress levels, erodes self-esteem, damages
relationships and threatens workplace safety and quality of life (Forni,
2008). Incivility also lowers morale, causes illness and leaves workers
feeling stressed, vulnerable and devalued. Therefore, creating and
sustaining communities of civility is an imperative and a call to action
for all of us. It is also my life’s work.
Civility does matter!
My primary thesis is this: If we identify and address lesser
acts of incivility before they escalate into aggression or violence, we
are far better off and, in the end, quality of life on all levels will
be improved. And here’s what I believe to my very core: Civility does
matter! It’s worth fighting the good fight to create and sustain
healthy academic and practice workplaces where respect is highly
regarded and where benevolence carries the day.
Healthy workplaces do not occur by accident. Creating them
requires intention, purpose and bold leadership from all levels of an
organization. Incivility takes a tremendous physical, emotional,
spiritual and financial toll on everyone. We must do better. One of the
most-read articles in Reflections on Nursing Leadership in 2010, the fourth of a five-part series, was one I co-authored with one of my nursing students, titled “What students can do to foster civility.”
In the next installment of this three-part series, I will
readdress what students can do to foster civility in nursing education.
Nursing students are our promise and our hope, the Jedi Knights who
will lead our noble profession to a bright future where civility reigns
and respect rules the day. I am excited to share their suggestions for a
civil tomorrow. RNL
Part Three: Molly’s perspective: How I applied No. 4 of Cindy’s ‘Five RITES’ (article by Cindy Clark's daughter)
For another article by Cindy Clark on civility and nursing students, see What students can do to promote civility.
Cynthia “Cindy” Clark, PhD, RN, ANEF, FAAN, professor at Boise State University School of Nursing and founder of Civility Matters, is a psychiatric nurse/therapist with advanced certification in addiction counseling. She is the author of “Musing of the great blue,” a blog written for Reflections on Nursing Leadership.
References:
Forni, P.M. (2008). The civility solution: What to do when people are rude. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.
Pearson, C., & Porath, C. (2009). The cost of bad behavior: How incivility is damaging your business and what to do about it. New York, NY: Penguin Group.
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Wednesday, April 8, 2015
Students, Jedi Knights and the promise of civility Part One
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