Turning Vulnerability into a Growth Mindset: LTU Professors Provide a Strategy for Classroom Success

Each fall, educators across colleges and universities are greeted by a class of new faces, wondering how they can be engaged, individually and collectively, in the common embrace of new concepts and information within a matter of a few short weeks.

The challenge of the new classroom can be further heightened in a multicultural setting where there are differences among students in race, ethnicity, language, customs, and learning styles. Lawrence Technological University’s College of Business and Information Technology professors Matthew Cole, PhD, dean of the college, and Jacqueline (Jackie) Stavros, DM¹, have addressed this issue head-on and provided the discerning educator with a strategy for success in navigating through this landscape to enhance the chances for pedagogic success. It is also a stunning call to action.

Embracing Vulnerability

Cole and Stavros unwrap their approach in Chapter 3 (Vulnerability as a Catalyst to Growth Mindset) of the just-released book Cultivating Equitable and Inclusive Conversations in Higher Education. For the toolkit value of Chapter 3 alone, this book should land at the top of the professional reading list for anyone teaching at the college level.

At the center of the strategy for the classroom proposed by Cole and Stavros is the need for educators to embrace vulnerability. Vulnerability here is not a sign of weakness but is a measure of courage, “the state of purposeful awareness and desire to disclose authentic experiences for the purpose of change,” as defined by Kimberly A. Wise, EdD, of Bridgewater State University. It is an understanding by the individual of who they are as a person, the situation they are in, the direction they must take, and the obstacles that may be encountered along the way.

Cole and Stavros advance four major points in this chapter:

1. Embracing vulnerability fosters a safe and inclusive learning environment.
2. Vulnerability encourages authentic self-expression and open dialogue.
3. Educators modeling vulnerability can inspire students to take risks and engage deeply with course material.
4. Creating a culture of vulnerability supports the development of a growth mindset among all participants.

Cultivating A Growth Mindset

The last point is the key component of the strategy, which Professors Cole and Stavros propose. If vulnerability is a fact of the human condition, how can it be unlocked to yield positive actions by students, which in turn lead to the adoption of a growth mindset? This is the compelling vision of the chapter. Cole and Stavros present a whole series of proven tactics based on their experience, including discussion points and in-class exercises, which can bring students along and show how embracing a growth mindset can be their personal launching pad to success.

A growth mindset—the idea that a person’s abilities and intelligence can be developed through effort, inspired teaching, and persistence—is a driving factor in personal progress, but it is not automatic; it is not always present, especially in students with untapped potential. The educator, however, is often confronted with students having a fixed mindset—the belief that abilities, intelligence, and talents cannot change. This orientation may especially be evident in some students from minority cultures and different traditions, and some with deep-seated biases. Through a series of vignettes, Cole and Stavros show how they successfully leveraged vulnerability with students in their classrooms to flip negative situations into positive opportunities for students to engage, collaborate, take intellectual risks (without fear of penalty), and see their abilities grow, beginning the embrace of a growth mindset. These students were then equipped to perform better academically and were more likely to successfully confront learning challenges.

“My experiences in male-dominated business and educational spaces gave me insight into inequities, but more importantly, they reinforced the value of resilience and taught me how to thrive in challenging environments.”

– Jacqueline (Jackie) Stavros, DM

Igniting Student Engagement

Beyond making the case for vulnerability as a catalyst for developing a growth mindset, Chapter 3 gives the educator a comprehensive, whole-semester classroom implementation plan for igniting student engagement by leveraging vulnerability. This is the plan Cole and Stavros use for their undergraduate business curriculum course at Lawrence Tech, Principles of Management. The professors successfully employ a wide range of strategies, including personal stories, peer discussions, journal reflections, collaborative activities, dialogue, and role-playing. They also integrate tactics such as introductory student questionnaires, a “Values/Vision/Mission with a Purpose” activity, goal setting, and how to ask generative questions, and reframe challenges as opportunities with the Flipping Tool: Name It/Flip It/Frame It. The SOAR (strengths, opportunities, aspirations, results) approach to strategic thinking, planning, leading, and conversation developed by Stavros is another key component of this classroom strategy.

“For Jackie and me, this has been far more than an academic exercise; we’ve lived this,” Cole said. Both professors have faced and overcome discrimination and marginalization in their own lives.  Cole, a first-generation Jewish American, attended his public high school during a shift from a majority White to a majority Black population.  “On the one hand, I saw how majority groups often held social and institutional power that could open doors and grant privileges,” he writes.  “On the other, I witnessed how marginalized groups – myself included, at times – had to contend with barriers and biases that limited opportunities.  This dual perspective deeply informs my commitment to fostering inclusive learning environments where power dynamics are recognized and addressed.”  Stavros was a first-generation college student and is a female with a multicultural background. Stavros shared, “My experiences in male-dominated business and educational spaces gave me insight into inequities, but more importantly, they reinforced the value of resilience and taught me how to thrive in challenging environments.” Cole and Stavros are committed as academicians to empowering underrepresented voices and creating thriving learning environments. For them, the thoughts, words, and actions of all students matter.