As we noted in our previous post in this two-part analysis (Puckett and Felten 2024), student-faculty and student-student relationships contribute significantly to learning, motivation, identity development, well-being, and graduation rates in higher education (Felten and Lambert 2020). The positive effects of student-faculty interactions are particularly important for first-generation undergraduates and students of color (Kezar and Maxey 2014).  

In our previous post, we focused on faculty perceptions about barriers to creating relationships with and among students in teaching. In this blog post, we share findings from a new analysis of faculty perceptions of “what works” to build relationships with and among students in their own contexts.  

Our Data 

Our data comes from a series of workshops Peter conducted from 2021 through 2024 (described in more detail in our previous post). He asked workshop participants variations on the question “What works when building relationships with and among students in your teaching context?” Using Mentimeter, Peter collected 2,137 individual responses. All submissions were anonymous.  

We used grounded theory to develop the coding scheme for our analysis. After talking with Peter about his sense of the responses, Kassidy read (and re-read) all entries, categorizing each. Peter double-checked Kassidy’s coding, and we talked through items that did not fit clearly into any category.   

Figure 1. Screenshot of Mentimeter question, ”What do you do to build relationships with and among students?” and a grid of responses. We received permission from Elon’s Institutional Review Board to analyze and publish this data.  

Trends in Relationship-Building Techniques 

Unlike the data about barriers to connection which involved single words/phrases, this Mentimeter question allowed participants to submit responses of up to 200 characters (approximately 30 words), although most responses tended to be 5-10 words.  

The 2,137 individual responses cover a very wide range of approaches, yet four of our categories account for some 59% of entries. These broad categories are, in frequency order: empathy, collaboration/group work, individual interactions with students, and sharing personal stories.  

1. Empathy 

This category includes diverse techniques that aim to understand and prioritize student well-being. Some 18% of participants (328 individual entries) submitted something we coded under “empathy.” A typical response here is “Find out their needs, meet them there,” and another common answer (as seen in the image above) is “Actively listen to them. When they know you hear them it matters.” Many faculty mentioned approaches to gathering information from their students such as “Engagement letters at the beginning of each course that ask students to reflect on their past experiences with [course topic] and share one thing they want their instructor to know about them as they begin.” This category aligns with recent research on “trust moves” in the classroom that emphasize the importance of affective actions by faculty to demonstrate care and concern for students’ learning and well-being (Felten, Forsyth, and Sutherland 2024).  

2. Collaboration and Group Work 

Building student collaboration into the course structure was the second most common technique described by faculty. Approximately 17% of participants shared a practice in this category (303 individual responses). This broad category includes everything from “think-pair-share” to long-term group projects. A few of the responses include “Mentoring—seniors with alumni and underclassmen with seniors” and “​​Group work, but calling them teams and having them come up with a team name and mascot!” We are heartened by this category being so frequent because while faculty-student relationships are difficult to scale (Felten 2024), connecting students purposefully with each other is possible even in the largest enrollment classes—and research demonstrates that structured active learning enhances learning for all students and helps to close equity gaps in academic performance (Hogan and Sathy 2022). 

3. Individual Interactions 

Individual interactions were the third most common category of responses, accounting for roughly 16% of participants (289 total). Many submissions mentioned either requiring students to attend office hours or creating opportunities for informal chats to emphasize the importance of meeting with students one-on-one. Some examples from this category are “I require my students to have an instructor meeting that is about getting to know them and hearing what works best for their learning” and “Reframe ‘office hours’ as ‘personal consultations’.” Research demonstrates that faculty-student interactions are educationally powerful (Astin 1997), but these often are difficult to sustain for instructors teaching many students. 

4. Personal Stories  

The final significant category, accounting for 14% of responses (253 participants), involves faculty sharing or inviting students to offer personal stories. Many faculty mentioned making themselves appear more “human” to students by recounting stories from their own education: “I like to share my background with students and let them know that in many cases I have been through what they are currently going through in their educational journey.” Many also highlighted the importance of creating opportunities for students to share pieces of themselves with their instructor or their peers, such as when one participant stated that they prioritize “creating consistent opportunities for students to share personal and professional experiences, and ideas about the learning topics.” This category is distinct from a traditional icebreaker or first day of class “get-to-know-you” activities, which we coded separately. While icebreakers tend to be relatively superficial, these stories are more likely to reveal some aspects of professional or (occasionally) personal identities that can be important in classroom trust-building (Felten, Forsyth, and Sutherland 2024). 

Other Strategies for Relationship-Building 

These four categories represent the majority of the 2,137 responses we analyzed, but faculty also mentioned a variety of other approaches to classroom relationship-building—everything from calling students by name to using classroom polling or games to spark discussion. Lots of helpful resources exist to support and inspire faculty who want to build trust with students, create relationship-rich environments in large enrollment courses, or empower students to build educationally purposeful relationships with peers in the classroom. These approaches can be helpful. Most often, however, faculty mentioned four categories—empathy, collaboration/group work, individual interactions with students, and sharing personal stories— when asked “what works to build relationships with and among students in your teaching context?” 

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References  

Astin, Alexander W. 1997. What Matters in College? San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.  

Felten, Peter. 2024. “Relationship-Rich Education at Scale, aka the Too Many Bodies Problem.” Center for Engaged Learning (blog), Elon University. April 16. https://www.centerforengagedlearning.org/relationship-rich-education-at-scale-aka-the-too-many-bodies-problem.  

Felten, Peter, and Leo M. Lambert. 2020. Relationship-Rich Education: How Human Connections Drive Success in College. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.  

Felten, Peter, Rachel Forsyth, and Kathryn Sutherland. 2023. “Building Trust in the Classroom: A Conceptual Model for Teachers, Scholars, and Academic Developers in Higher Education.” Teaching & Learning Inquiry, 11. https://doi.org/10.20343/teachlearninqu.11.20. 

Hogan, Kelly A., and Viji Sathy. 2022. Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom. Morgantown, WV: West Virginia University Press. 

Kezar, Adrianna, and Dan Maxey. 2014. “Faculty Matter: So Why Doesn’t Everyone Think So.” Thought & Action 30, 29-44.  

Puckett, Kassidy and Peter Felten. “What Are Barriers to Relationship-Rich Education? Faculty Perspectives.” Center for Engaged Learning (blog), Elon University. November 5. https://www.centerforengagedlearning.org/what-are-barriers-to-relationship-rich-education/.

About the Authors  

Kassidy Puckett is a student in the Masters of Higher Education program completing her graduate apprenticeship with undergraduate admissions. She is also a class of 2024 alumna who studied secondary history education through the Elon Teaching Fellows Program.   

Peter Felten is Executive Director of the Center for Engaged Learning, Professor of History, and Assistant Provost for Teaching and Learning at Elon University.  

How to Cite This Post

Puckett, Kassidy and Peter Felten. ““What Works” When Building Educational Relationships?” Center for Engaged Learning (blog), Elon University. December 13. https://www.centerforengagedlearning.org/what-works-when-building-educational-relationships/.