A Pedagogy of Kindness Book Discussion

Monday, November 24, 2025
2:00 PM - 3:00 PM
Zoom

Facilitated by Hannah Radcliff-Hoy

Join us for a thoughtful and engaging discussion of Catherine Denial’s A Pedagogy of Kindness, a timely and transformative work that challenges traditional notions of rigor and authority in higher education. Denial invites educators to reimagine their teaching practices through the lens of kindness—centering trust, equity, and care in the classroom.

Synopsis from Oklahoma Press: Academia is not, by and large, a kind place. Individualism and competition are what count. But without kindness at its core, Catherine Denial suggests, higher education fails students and instructors—and its mission—in critical ways.

Part manifesto, part teaching memoir, part how-to guide, A Pedagogy of Kindness urges higher education to get aggressive about instituting kindness, which Denial distinguishes from niceness. Having suffered beneath the weight of just “getting along,” instructors need to shift every part of what they do to prioritizing care and compassion—for students as well as for themselves.

A Pedagogy of Kindness articulates a fresh vision for teaching, one that focuses on ensuring justice, believing people, and believing in people. Offering evidence-based insights and drawing from her own rich experiences as a professor, Denial offers practical tips for reshaping syllabi, assessing student performance, and creating trust and belonging in the classroom. Her suggestions for concrete, scalable actions  outline nothing less than a transformational discipline—one in which, together, we create bright new spaces, rooted in compassion, in which all engaged in teaching and learning might thrive.

Dates: Fourth Mondays (September 22, October 27, and November 24) at 2:00 pm 
Delivery mode: Zoom Only