CSP Feature
Teaching With Compassion & Empathy: How CSP’s Tony Ervin Supports His Students From Afar With a background in math and physics, CSP professor Tony Ervin worked as a 3M engineer for nearly 30 years. He has always had a passion for teaching and knew it was something he wanted to pursue post-retirement. In 2014, he joined CSP’s faculty of practice and has been teaching Math 101 to online students ever since. “When I was in graduate school I taught part-time to pay my bills and I loved teaching. So, when I retired from 3M I knew I wanted to go back to this,” Ervin says.
semester students. Shortly after COVID-19 began to rapidly spread throughout the country, Colbert’s grandmother contracted the virus. She shared her concerns with Ervin and he offered her his prayers and support. Days later, Colbert’s grandmother had passed. As a mother, wife, student, and kindergarten teacher/after-school program director, Colbert already had a lot on her plate. Now, she had to factor in time to grieve. Ervin whole-heartedly expressed his sympathies and offered her extensions as she processed the grief.
While Ervin has a knack for mathematics, he understands that it is a subject where many students struggle. Over the last six years, he has developed a teaching method that relies heavily on compassion and empathy. This has been effective in creating an environment where his students can comfortably reach out, whether they are struggling to understand coursework, or trying to find a balance The basis of how I teach 101 between their education and their day-tois using compassion and day lives. His method is one that students empathy,” he shares. “If you have responded positively to and is proving teach with compassion and to be crucial as we adjust to a COVID-19 empathy, if the students are world. “My students have a lot of math anxiety,” he says, “It’s a seven-week class and so their anxiety is very understandable because it's a lot of work in a short time,, but,” he emphasizes, “it’s a lot of fun.”
going through difficult times they may share them with you.
That anxiety has only increased as already busy students have now had to factor in a whole new set of obstacles related to the ongoing pandemic. “I have students that are working in hospitals and they’re taking care of COVID-19 patients, and they are very, very concerned that they might get sick and not be able to finish the class,” Ervin explains. “So, I let them work ahead as far as they want to work ahead. They’re very bright, very talented because they’re working full time and they can do it.” During the spring semester, one of his students was living in New York City in a neighborhood with a high rate of COVID-19 cases. She shared with Ervin that she just wanted to get through the course, so if she did get sick, she wouldn’t have to worry about keeping up on assignments. “If they want to move ahead and get through the class quickly because they’re worried, by all means, I’ll let them work as fast as they get through it,” Ervin says. Ervin has also made sure to be accommodating for students who may need extra time. Juanita Colbert was one of Ervin’s spring
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FALL/WINTER 2020 • CONCO RDIA ST. PAUL MAGAZINE
–Prof. Tony Ervin
“She caught up,” Ervin proudly declares. “She got an A in the class. To be able to do all that, to grieve the loss, and work full time, I so admire that young lady, I really do.” Ervin prioritizes creating relationships with his online learners to help them feel comfortable throughout the course and ensure that they succeed.
“The basis of how I teach 101 is using compassion and empathy,” he shares. “If you teach with compassion and empathy, if the students are going through difficult times they may share them with you.” He recognizes this as an important part of his role as an educator, now more than ever before. Many of his students are enrolled in online programs, meaning they are often juggling a handful of commitments in addition to their schooling. This can include working full-time, raising children, and serving in the military. They also lack the daily in-person interactions found in the traditional classroom, so open communication can be more challenging to establish. Ervin has found a way to break down that digital barrier and create an approachable environment through the power of sharing stories. He explains that, generally, if he opens up to students, they will open up to him. He humbly describes his method saying, “It’s not very profound at all.” For Ervin, teaching during the pandemic is not much different than what he had been doing before. It has merely been an extension of his simple philosophy to teach with compassion and empathy.
