Who are you as a teacher? Dr. Johnston’s “Introduction to Secondary Teaching” builds from that question outward. He weaves together teacher identity, presence, passion, and stance with social justice pedagogy and evidence-based practice into a framework built for real classrooms.

This textbook will help you introduce the concepts of inequality and social change to the students to act and think like global citizens!

If teaching students about linear regression challenges you, try this BBQ Statistics assignment! This U.S. iconic foods help introduce your students to step-by-step statistical operations.

Let’s introduce students to the concepts of food being connected to individual, local, regional, and global community with this resource.

Our latest webinar focused on how — and why — we teach methods. Joined by Drs. Vanessa Gonlin (Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of Georgia) and Jennifer Turner (Senior Research Associate, Institute for Women’s Policy Research [IWPR]), we discussed engaging students in methods, fostering a critical lens, and preparing them for careers beyond the classroom. The full conversation can be seen here; below, we summarize (editing for clarity) and reflect on these themes.

A Grounded Approach to Teaching Methods

Both panelists know firsthand the anxiety students bring to methods courses. Rather than ignore it, they lean in. They employ approaches that bring the student into their learning and grounding methods in their own experiences.  This makes methods feel accessible rather than intimidating. 

Vanessa opens each class with a brief mindful meditation: “engaging in breathing, grounding, centering ourselves, finding peace and serenity within ourselves, knowing we can always come to ourselves for support and stability at any time during this process.” (6:23)

This reduces anxiety and reframes the process of engaging methods positively. Building on this,  Jennifer shared: 

“It’s not always about having the right answer. I think getting comfortable, or helping students get comfortable with asking questions, and knowing that you don’t always have to have the right answer. Sometimes it’s more important to know what questions to ask than it is to have all the answers.” (26:06)

For Jennifer, helping students get comfortable with the challenge of learning methods goes hand in hand with demystifying them. She urges students to start with observing the familiar spaces they move through every day, like campus: 

“My strategy is to help students understand that methods are tools to help them understand the world. So, really demystifying what methods are and having them apply methods to their lives in a very real way. So one of the exercises I would do with my qualitative methods students is have them go to the student center on campus and take field notes and observations – just have them think critically about how we observe, because we’re always observing the social world.” (8:39) 

This first step builds comfort with methods while nudging students toward the “so what” questions by connecting everyday patterns to larger social contexts and problems.

Engaging a Critical Eye to Methods

Grounding students is only the beginning. Both Vanessa and Jennifer emphasize the importance of positionality and helping students recognize that who they are shapes how they see the world, apply methods, ask questions, and engage with participants. Jennifer said: 

“We know that when we’re doing research, there’s already a power dynamic between the researcher and the research participant. How do we deconstruct that? It’s something that I spend a lot of time thinking about. How can we engage with our communities in a way that is respectful, [and] not as transactional as possible.” (12:20)

Vanessa elaborated from a quantitative methods perspective, offering a concrete example of how discussion of positionality happens in her methods classroom: 

“The way that I engage in this is having my students do critical reflexivity statements… critical reflexivity in a quantitative methods arena, would be more like, what questions are you asking? Who’s funding the research that you’re doing? What’s the question order that you have? ….If you’re doing [research on] gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, how do you ask questions on a survey in a way that people understand and is supportive of their identities…..” (15:46)

This critical reflection on positionality opens the door to a broader, more critical approach to methods — one that connects systems of power to personal experience in service of the communities being studied. Vanessa draws on her quant crit background to explain:

“Quant crit builds on critical race theory, and so quant crit is basically saying: let’s consider the limitations and some of the weaknesses of quantitative methods… and let’s consider how we can actually address this and be more supportive of the communities that we want to study…” (16:41)

She later elaborated, 

“ …you might question that and say well, we are all subjective, and we all bring our own beliefs into the research that we do, the questions that we ask in the first place, the people that we talk to, the way that we analyze data, etcetera. So if we’re recognizing that, maybe we can strive for objectivity, but we are all subjective, and maybe that can help us think about the value of other people’s perspectives and experiences, because if I’m on a research team, but I’m studying a group of people that’s outside of my own group, I’m bringing my own perspectives, beliefs, thoughts about that group into the research.” (48:32)

What Next? 

Our panelists also offered insights on why methods skills and tools are important for our students beyond the classroom. Jennifer spoke directly to what research teams in non-academic settings are looking for:

“I would say intellectual curiosity….genuine interest in whatever the research topic is. They don’t have to be an expert on the topic by any means, but just a genuine interest and a passion, to some extent, for the project. And cross-disciplinarity flexibility is also really important, specifically in the context of a think-tank or, I guess you could say, an academia-adjacent context, because oftentimes you’re working with researchers that don’t come from your same field.” (26:43)

The conversation came full circle here. As both panelists noted earlier, methods isn’t about right and wrong. It’s about the questions we ask and the impact they have. Jennifer reflects that same spirit in how she thinks about assessment:

“… what did we find in this? What were we hoping to find? Did we achieve this goal?… and sometimes those [goals] are tied to funders, right? So you might have a funder deliverable that you’re trying to meet and funder deliverables often require that type of reflection at the end of a project, where you assess what you learned and what you could have done better. You think about how your research findings can be applied broadly. You think about the impact of your research.” (29:41)

Vanessa adds that responsibility extends to consuming research, not just producing it: “I think it leads people to have a more critical lens on the work that they read, even if they are not engaging in data collection or analysis themselves.” (18:28)

We’ll close with Jennifer, whose words capture what sociology distinctly brings to methods:

“One of the things that I really love about sociologists, and why I really like being a sociologist, is that we think about people, and why the work we do, the topics we study, matter to people. … About how [research] affects people in their everyday lives, or how people make decisions in their everyday lives, and what factors come into play when people make decisions.” (36:04)

Teaching methods is ultimately about producing responsible knowledge and responsible consumers of it. We familiarize students with tools, demystify their fears, and help them find the methods best suited to their questions. But technical skill building is only part of it. A critical lens grounded in positionality or quant crit approaches must travel with students from the classroom into every research setting they enter.

Our panelists made clear that success, then, isn’t measured by methods mastery alone, but by the responsibility students develop toward the communities they study. How they ask questions, collect data, and analyze findings has real consequences for how populations are understood, and for the decisions made about them. Sociology methods instruction can help students, as Jennifer puts it, “build relationships that are not transactional, but authentic and ethical” (28:11) and to carry that ethic with them into the world.

Use this resource based on “Teenage” documentary and the New York Times “Teenage Bill of Rights” (1945) to help students analyze adolescence as a socially constructed life stage.

In the midst of censoring educators to teach right version of U.S. history, settler colonialism deems unpleasant. Nonetheless, the phenomenon is ongoing and we can draw from Indigenous scholars and Native Nations. See this syllabus on TRAILS.

As much as we want to see a university as a neutral space for all students, it’s probably a more “Racialized Space” than you might think it is. See this activity for teaching about race and space in higher education.

Creating responsible spaces for learning about harm, prevention, and justice.

I have been teaching Victimology in one form or another since graduate school, and I currently
teach as an adjunct professor at the University of Bridgeport. Over the years, the classroom has
shifted in ways that are both visible and felt. Students are more willing to talk about mental
health, more open about supporting loved ones through trauma, and more honest about the
emotional weight they carry into academic spaces. At the same time, the content of Victimology
has not become any less heavy. If anything, the world students are inhabiting has made
conversations about victimization more immediate, more personal, and more difficult to
compartmentalize.

In any classroom where we discuss harm, violence, exploitation, and systemic injustice, it is
almost guaranteed that some students have been directly or indirectly affected by these
experiences. Victimization is not abstract. It is lived. It is primary, secondary, and tertiary. It
exists in personal histories, family systems, relationships, and communities. The question, then,
is not whether students bring trauma into the room. They do. The question is how we teach in
ways that acknowledge this reality without turning the classroom into a site of harm itself.
Students often enter Victimology wanting to help others, but quickly realize the material is
emotionally complex. At the intersection of criminal justice and mental health, the course
challenges them to understand trauma, resilience, and the human impact of victimization, not just
crime itself. I begin each semester by naming this tension and emphasizing that engagement does
not require personal disclosure. Through content notices, I prioritize choice, consent, and
preparation so students can approach difficult material with awareness, pace themselves, and
seek support without feeling overwhelmed or caught off guard.

Creating a “safe space” is often framed as the goal in courses that deal with trauma. I am more
interested in creating what I think of as a responsibly held space. Safety in a classroom that
studies victimization cannot mean comfort at all costs. Discomfort is part of learning. But harm
is not. The line between the two is not always obvious, and it requires constant attention. This
means establishing norms for discussion that prioritize respect, boundaries, and care. It means
interrupting harmful language when it appears, even when it is framed as debate. It means
reminding students that analyzing systems of harm within criminal justice institutions is different
from interrogating each other’s lived experiences.

One of the most difficult pedagogical balances in Victimology is the relationship between
connection and containment. I want students to connect to the material. I want them to
understand how theories of victimization intersect with real lives, real policies, and real
consequences. I want them to see how prevention strategies, trauma-informed practices, and
survivor-centered approaches can reshape institutions. But connection can slide into
overidentification, and over-identification can slide into emotional flooding. In a field where
empathy is often framed as a professional virtue, we rarely talk enough about the labor of
learning how to compartmentalize in healthy ways. I am explicit with students that part of their
professional development involves learning how to engage deeply without absorbing everything
as their own. This is not emotional numbing. It is emotional boundary-setting.

Assignments are where these tensions surface most clearly, as students often assume they must
share personal experiences to demonstrate learning. I challenge this by emphasizing that
reflection is optional, not required. Instead, I design assignments focused on applying theory to
case studies, policy, media, and institutional responses. When reflection is included, it centers on
perception and ethics, not personal disclosure. I make it clear that grades are not tied to personal
revelation, reminding students that they do not need to make their trauma visible to be taken
seriously, a message that often relieves unspoken pressure.

Classroom conversations require similar care. When discussions become emotionally charged, I
slow the pace. I name what I am noticing. I remind students that feeling something is not the
same as being obligated to share it. Silence is allowed. Stepping out is allowed. Writing instead
of speaking is allowed. These small permissions matter. They communicate that the classroom is
not a performance space for pain, but a learning space where emotional responses are
acknowledged without being extracted.

At the same time, I am aware that I am teaching in a moment when students are not only
exploring their own mental health, but often supporting partners, family members, and friends
who are struggling. The classroom does not exist in isolation from these realities. Many students
are navigating coursework in criminal justice and mental health fields while simultaneously
carrying the emotional labor of care in their personal lives. Deadlines, participation expectations,
and academic rigor still matter, but flexibility and humanity matter too. Trauma-informed
pedagogy is not about lowering standards. It is about recognizing that students are learning in
bodies and minds shaped by experiences that do not turn off when class begins.

I often reflect on the emotional labor we ask of students in Victimology, engaging with harm,
analyzing broken systems, and imagining themselves working within them. We rarely consider
what this costs them while they are still developing. As one student shared, “I care about this
field, but sometimes it feels like learning about it is hurting me.” That stays with me as a
reminder that teaching this material carries real ethical responsibility.

Teaching Victimology requires exposing students to the realities of trauma, but exposure alone is
not education. Education involves context, support, structure, and care. It involves helping
students learn how to think critically about harm without normalizing it, how to engage
emotionally without being consumed by it, and how to imagine professional roles in criminal
justice and mental health that include boundaries as well as empathy. The classroom becomes
one of the first spaces where students practice balancing advocacy with sustainability, care with
prevention, and passion with professional limits.

I do not believe it is possible to fully protect students from the emotional impact of studying
victimization, nor do I think that should be the goal. What is possible is to teach in ways that
acknowledge the psychological terrain students are navigating. We can be intentional about how
we introduce content, how we structure dialogue, how we design assignments, and how we talk
about mental health not as an aside, but as part of the learning process itself. In doing so, we
model a version of professional engagement that does not require emotional self-erasure. We
teach students that their humanity is not a liability in this field, but it does require care,
boundaries, and support.

In a moment when students are increasingly open about their mental health and increasingly
exposed to collective and personal trauma, how we talk about victimization in the classroom
matters. The classroom becomes one of the first sites where students learn not only what
victimization is, but how it intersects with criminal justice, mental health, prevention, and care.
More importantly, it becomes a space where they learn how to carry this work forward without
losing themselves in the process.

Brianna Stefano holds a Bachelor of Science in Forensic Psychology from the University of New Haven and a Master of Arts in Criminal Justice from the University of Bridgeport. She has served as an adjunct professor at the University of Bridgeport for the past three years, teaching courses in Criminology, Juvenile Delinquency, and Victimology. Her work centers on the intersection of criminal justice, psychology, and sociology, with a particular focus on the human and emotional dimensions of victimization. In addition to her academic research, she applies these frameworks to organizational settings, specializing in emotional health, psychological safety, and workplace well-being.

We try our best to be inclusive to all students. Let’s explore this LinkedIn blog post on “Curricular Barriers That Harm Neurodivergent Students of Color.”