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supervisor, respectively. It reminds me how these wonderful women accommodated me in their busy academic schedules by helping me when I needed it in my educational journey or my personal life.
For example, I remember how in 2019, when I had taken a huge life decision to resign from my primary school teaching position to return to further my studies, one of my professors supported me all the way, playing a critical role from the very first step of the process up to the very last step. I will never forget that journey, as it was such a big journey filled with mixed feelings and emotions. After qualifying as a teacher, I never thought that one day – or perhaps not so early – I would ever resign from work to pursue my postgraduate studies and academic career. Yes, by that time, I was so in love with the academy, and at the end of the day, I was going to take that big decision, but I never thought it was going to be so early on. My professor supported me through thick and thin until the whole process was completed – and for that, I will never forget her. She will always be in my heart, and I will always and forever be grateful to her, for she has played a critical and crucial role in my life.
I learnt from this students can believe in themselves more if they are shown more support by their teachers in higher education spaces. Furthermore, students can gain more confidence in taking big decisions and applying their problem-solving skills to issues they encounter if they are fully supported by their teachers (see, among others, Karpouza & Emvalotis, 2019). This is evident in my case, as I gained a great deal of confidence in sticking with the initial decision I had made to resign from work to pursue my postgraduate studies and academic career, despite all of the difficulties and obstacles that had arisen along the way. Moreover, teachers in higher education spaces can encourage their learners to believe in themselves more by showing them support for their dreams and visions (see, among others, Karpouza & Emvalotis, 2019). In that way, supportive teacher-learner relationships in higher education spaces can be enriched, leading to more significant academic outcomes.
5.3 One event of an unsupportive teacher-learner relationship I experienced in
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smells from far away as I made my way to the laboratory. I remember how I always sensed the smell of a freshly cleaned bathroom or of metal, which always made me think I was in the big factory in town. That was the Science laboratory that we used to work in. It was where we used to conduct practicals each week. It was full of science apparatus such as test tubes, beakers, and Bunsen burners, among many others. It was surrounded by microscopes at the edges of the whole room, with writing tables facing each other.
I remember the second time we were in the laboratory; the first lecture had been all about learning the theory of safety in the laboratory and watching safety demonstration videos. For a moment, I felt like I was in the middle of nowhere when our lecturer told us that nobody would help the other and that each of us was on our own. Yes, we had read the practical instructions in the practical booklet we were given, but for some of us – me included – it was our first time seeing a real microscope.
I had only seen and read about a microscope in a textbook at school. As earlier mentioned, although there were science laboratories in my high school, they were rarely used. Also, although they had many of the required equipment for doing practicals and experiments, there were no microscopes. Therefore, at school, we rarely did Science and/or Technology practicals or experiments, and most of them were theorised in cases where they were conducted.
Therefore, from this background, I faced one of the most challenging episodes of my life in higher education during practical sessions.
I remember when I switched on the microscope for the first time after some time focused on repeatedly reading instructions in the practical booklet. The microscope just responded by showing me some white light and waiting for me to do the action. I remember that I had an onion slide that had to be put under the microscope, which I did, but I could not see the image I was supposed to. The problem was that I did not know which knob to adjust so that I would be able to see the slide. While I was still in that confusion, I remember my lecturer shouting and saying, “Only draw what you can see on the microscope, not your own things”. Because of being too scared, I could not do anything positive next. Many of us just waited and stared at the microscope as if we were telling it to do some magic and operate itself. Many of us had never used or, in fact, even seen a real microscope before, and I was no exception. However, my lecturer appeared not to see and understand this. The struggle was written on the faces of many of us, and our lecturer seemed to choose to ignore it (Figure 5.4). When the session ended, I had only done a few things, and was so sure that I would fail that practical.
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Figure 5.4: My visual journaling on unsupportive teacher-learner relationships in higher education through practicals in the laboratory.
Weeks followed, and other practicals continued to be done in the laboratory. My lecturer did not seem to care at all about our struggles – it became the onus of the student to do extra work to learn the basics and how the laboratory operates. The laboratory came to seem like hell to me, as I worked under pressure each time I was there. The place was filled with unsupportive learner-learner relationships as directed by our lecturer. It was also filled with unsupportive teacher-learner relationships directed at us as students (in this case referred to as learners) by our lecturer.
This event is one that I will never forget, as it showed me unsupportive teacher-learner relationships at their worst level at an HEI. This memory suggests that, in some circumstances, teacher-learner relationships in higher education continues to be a neglected domain, where only academic outcomes and fulfilling one’s academic role are taken as the business of the day in the educational space (see, among others, Asikainen et al., 2018; Xerri et al., 2018).
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5.5 Informal conversation with my selected university friend in helping me to