Introduction to the Special Issue—A Class of Our Own: Teaching Sociology by,for,and about First-Generation and Working-Class People

Context

In the United States today, the working class is increasingly diverse, and class cultural differences strain social life and hinder social mobility (King 2019; Metzgar 2021; Wilson 2016; Wilson and Roscigno 2018). The 2018 General Social Survey reported that 43 percent of respondents in the United States identified as working class. Fifty percent of students entering college are the first in their families to do so (Spalter-Roth, Van Vooren, and Senter 2015:1). These statistics suggest that regardless of institutional setting, instructors represent and regularly engage with people from FGWC backgrounds.

We stand at a pivotal moment in higher education, especially as it relates to those from FGWC backgrounds. Higher education is still commonly seen as the mechanism through which people from FGWC backgrounds can best attain upward mobility, but rising tuition costs and ever-increasing student loan debt reveal that the costs of college can deepen, rather than relieve, social inequality (Gannon 2020; Seamster and Charron-Chénier 2017). Those from FGWC backgrounds are reevaluating the costs and benefits of pursuing higher education (Basaldua 2023; Charron-Chénier et al. 2022; Francis 2022; King et al. 2020; Orphan 2018). For students from FGWC backgrounds who attempt higher education, the opportunity also entails personal costs and burdens (Hinz 2016; Hurst 2010; Lehmann 2013; Warnock and Hurst 2016). On campus, they may need to navigate class-cultural mismatch and a hidden curriculum, while off campus, they often face breakaway guilt with friends and family (Anyon 1983; Covarrubias and Fryberg 2015; Jack 2014; Lehmann 2021; London 1989; Rice et al. 2017; Stephens et al. 2012). These contexts shape the potential for and dynamics of social mobility through higher education for both students and faculty (Scherer 2022; Towers 2019).

This attention to people from FGWC backgrounds in higher education has produced a growing appreciation for what FGWC people contribute to higher education as students, staff, and faculty (Casey 2005; King and McPherson 2020; Lee and Maynard 2017; Lehman 2009, 2013; Roscigno et al. 2022; Warnock 2014; Yosso 2005). Colleges across the country are implementing a range of interventions, from pedagogical strategies to campus programming to support students from FGWC backgrounds (Baldwin et al. 2022; Guzmán et al. 2021; King and McPherson 2020; Soria 2015). These efforts are informed by and documented in research about the experiences of people from FGWC backgrounds in student affairs, education, and sociology.

Understanding and addressing both the strengths and needs of FGWC students and faculty begins in the classroom. Research reveals how faculty at teaching-intensive institutions with access-oriented missions come to identify with their FGWC students (Orphan and Broom 2021). Those of us teaching sociology in these contexts often have a wealth of pedagogical knowledge as we work closely with a high proportion of FGWC students in our access-oriented institutions (Gannon 2020; King and McPherson 2020; Scherer 2022). However, as the ASA Task Force report illustrated, instructors at teaching-intensive institutions, who are disproportionately from FGWC backgrounds themselves, often face the professional bind of having limited time, resources, or professional incentive to publish (Roscigno et al. 2022; Vossen 2017).

Student Support

In “Collectively Building Bridges,” authors Florence Emilia Castillo, Gustavo Garcia, Alejandro Mendiaz Rivera, Ana Paula Milán Hinostroza, and Natalia M. Toscano share how they provide support to their FGWC, Latiné students using Chicana feminist practices of pláticas (conversations) and convivencia (coexistence). The authors, four graduate students and one administrator, serve as mentors to Latiné students who are navigating their paths to graduate school. As FGWC scholars themselves, the authors mix the personal with the practical by describing their own experiences and offering examples of how to engage FGWC BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, people of color) students.

In “Effectively Engaging First-Generation Rural Students,” Anjel Stough-Hunter and Kristi S. Lekies give much needed attention to the intersection of rural and FGWC identities. These students bring unique strengths but also face unique challenges as they enter our classrooms. Stough-Hunter and Lekies offer ideas for engaging rural first-generation students at the classroom, faculty, department, and institutional levels, offering a helpful corrective to the often urban-centric teaching of sociology.

Course Content

The author of “Blended Learning in Social Statistics Courses,” Amanda Mireles, examines differences in the experience of statistics anxiety among first-generation and continuing-generation students and assesses the impact of blended learning instructional techniques. She finds that blended learning supports have a statistically significant positive effect for both first-generation and continuing-generation college students. Mireles’s findings emphasize how implementing mechanisms to support students from FGWC backgrounds often improves learning for all students.

In “From Inclusive to Equitable,” Michel Estefan, Jesse Cordes Selbin, and Sarah Macdonald offer assignments and learning activities that extend beyond trite demonstrations of inclusivity. Instead, they propose a framework and share strategies aimed at addressing structural disadvantages and inequalities experienced by FGWC students. A refreshing departure from deficit model practices, the authors outline interventions designed to close the equity gap by valuing the lived experiences of FGWC students.

Through “Family Work Histories,” Ana-María González Wahl introduces a long-running family work history project that provides a unique opportunity for students to examine the historical forces shaping their lives. While the project can be meaningful for all students, Wahl describes how it validates and centers the experiences and insights of FGWC students.

In “Playing Spent!,” Heather-Ann Layth examines the fraught issue of implementing poverty simulation activities in courses with students from diverse class backgrounds. By specifically studying how FGWC background shapes student experiences with these activities, she illustrates how these activities can be a liberatory learning exercise for FGWC students while providing their more privileged peers valuable perspective. Layth demonstrates how honoring the lived experiences and cultural capital that FGWC students bring to the classroom enriches our courses and improves learning for all.

Faculty Experiences

In “From Here to There: Using Required Courses to Expand First-Generation Mentorship Accessibility,” Tara Opsal, Elena Windsong, and Laurence Pedroni present a department-level career readiness mentoring initiative designed to remove the barriers often faced by FGWC students (e.g., by integrating program content into required courses to ensure equal access). The four-module initiative is laid out in the article, with detailed discussion of implementation and outcomes for the first module, which emphasizes real-world application of skills acquired via a sociology major. This article will be useful for any conscientious department or faculty member who aims to balance concerns about sociology majors’ career readiness with knowledge about mentoring access and equity.

In “Theorizing the Teaching Triad,” authors Victoria Reyes, Sara Bruene, Tyler Cohen, Shaafi Farooqi, and Shayna La Scala incorporate teaching assistants (TAs) into pedagogical theorizing through what they call the “teaching triad,” an analytic heuristic to understand faculty-TA-undergraduate interactions. The article focuses on three types of faculty pedagogies and their effects: (1) in authoritarian pedagogies, faculty exhibit inflexible, controlling behaviors that create a silencing and distrustful climate; (2) absentee pedagogies, characterized by a lack of faculty presence, which results in additional labor for TAs and confusion and panic for students; and (3) advocate pedagogies, which involve proactively engaged and flexible faculty approaches, cultivating an empowered environment.

Finally, in “Teaching across the FGWC Terrain: Reflections from Sociology Educators,” four authors from FGWC backgrounds, Nicole Oehmen, Jennifer Haylett, Leia Belt, and Jesse Clark, employ collaborative autoethnography and an intersectional lens to explore similarities and differences in their teaching experiences across race, gender, parental status, and institutional context. The variety of perspectives, paired with the authors’ shared commitment to FGWC students’ success, yields unique insights into what it means to foster inclusive classrooms.

Each article was reviewed by two editors and a third external reviewer, all of whom are named in the article. We intentionally sought reviewers who represent diverse experiences and expertise. However, we did have one critical oversight: Despite our best intentions, all our additional reviewers were women, a group that we know is already disproportionately asked for service work like peer review. We are beyond grateful that they agreed and assisted us in this effort.