A New Year, A New Semester
In Fall 2025, I joined an inaugural cohort of faculty interested in learning and practicing racial equity teaching in our classroom. One of the exercises that facilitators asked us to engage is a letter to students modeled after those in Stories from the Front of the Room: How Higher Education Faculty of Color Overcome Challenges and Thrive in the Academy (Harris et al., 2017). The letters in this anthology and particularly Dr. Jennifer Sims’ “Open Letter to the Black Woman in the Front Row” deeply moved me and shaped my engagement with the letter-writing activity. As a first-year faculty, I experienced my share of highs and lows during the Fall 2025 semester, and as I look ahead to the Spring 2026 semester and the pedagogical moves I want to make to affirm my ethical commitments to Kānaka and ʻāina, I am reminded of growing concerns about mental health and community safety and wellbeing. This past fall, I discovered writing between the tiles in women’s restrooms across campus. While some are light-hearted jokes, many can be read as anonymous requests for help and serious reflections on the psychological and physiological pressures that higher education institutions place upon young people.
Strengths and struggles written between tiles…
As many anti-colonial, womanist, and Indigenous writers, activists, and philosophers remind us time and time again, we must reject false claims that struggle builds “grit,” that our wellbeing is second to academic “success,” that this system, this status quo, this reality is permanent. We must refuse to play according to dominant “rules of the game.” We must resist socializing messages from oppressors.
As I look ahead to the opportunities and challenges that may emerge during this next semester and the 2026 year, I keep these lessons close to my heart and the emotions I felt when I came face-to-face with stories of strength and struggle on UC Berkeley’s campus. I also share my own story through a letter written toward the end of November 2025.
Dear students, present and future,
You may wonder why I ask how you’re doing when we meet for office hours (and if I really want you to hear you tell me about what you’re going through). You may ask why I open my emails hoping you had a good day or a restorative weekend (again, and if I mean it). You may question why I ask you to reflect on your health and wellness or spend time meditating or talking story in a circle. What does any of this have to do with education? I don’t follow this personal protocol because I am not “serious” about teaching or learning and do not value class time. I do not move this way to “act” or “perform.”
It does, however, have something to do with that fact that I am a young faculty member, and I am a woman. Compared to some of my older colleagues, I explicitly position myself in classroom settings as an educator with recent schooling experiences. Compared to some of my male colleagues, I explicitly talk about my femininity and my womanhood during lectures. I tear up a little when I talk about current events.
Some of you may believe me when I say that I care about your health and well-being, that I want you to be mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually well. Some of you may not. Some of you may roll your eyes when I dedicate time during class to check in, when my voice cracks when I communicate my concern, when I tell you that I want you to feel comfortable, safe, and secure in our community and this campus. “There she goes again, getting emotional.”
Some of you may indeed feel open to disclosing your feelings and being transparent about your comments. Some of you may appreciate weekly check ins. Some of you may be experiencing major life changes and communicating your thoughts and feelings is the last thing you want to be doing. Some of you may be suspicious of professors. Some of you may not want to talk.
To those who participate, to those who do not, I offer these additional reasons to explain why I prioritize your wellness even if you, UC Berkeley, society tells you not to:
I am a daughter, a granddaughter, a cousin, a niece, and an aunty. I am someone’s child and a future ancestor, and I recognize that you are too.
In my short time as an educator, I have known students who no longer wanted to be on the physical realm, and one of my students lost their battle with mental health without knowing that they are deeply loved.
My time on this Earth is finite, and I choose to leave it in a better state than when I inherited it.
I believe academic “success” is intimately connected to one’s holistic wellness and balance across body, mind, spirit, and heart.
I believe classroom settings do not have to be spaces where feelings and emotions cannot exist.
Years from now, you may not remember the content of this course, but you may remember how you felt and how you were treated.
To me, these glimpses into my beliefs and my values reveal my sense of hope for a future in which we prioritize love, joy, and well-being in schools. My personal protocols and pedagogical practices remind me that there are serious “stakes” in the world, and harming students and colleagues through impersonal interactions is not the type of legacy I want to build or the example I want to set for future generations.
While you may not believe me yet, please know that I do care about you, and I do want you to see, know, and feel that your presence matters.
Sincerely, Kourtney
