2016 Annual Conference

Brookfield identifies two conditions that have an adverse effect upon institutional efforts to recruit and retain students: impostership and cultural suicide (2006). This study was designed to identify student populations most likely to suffer from one of these two conditions and determine effective means to lessen their effects.

Because of the emphasis that education places upon critical modes of thinking, it is vital that faculty, administration, and staff make efforts to identify and address students’ feelings of impostership, also known as imposter syndrome, in order to create an environment in which students can engage in the types of thinking that will make them successful in education and in their careers.

In his book, The Skillful Teacher, Stephen Brookfield identifies two conditions that have an adverse effect upon institutional efforts to recruit and retain students: impostership and cultural suicide (2006). Because of the emphasis that education places upon critical modes of thinking, it is vital that faculty, administration, and staff make efforts to identify and address students’ feelings of impostership, also known as imposter syndrome, in order to create an environment in which students can engage in the types of thinking that will make them successful in both college and in their careers.
Cultural suicide involves a conflict between students’ home cultures and the culture that they encounter at school. When students begin to engage in critical thought, they may begin to question aspects of their home culture that they may have previously accepted without question. They may begin to reconsider traditional roles and religious beliefs in light of new experiences, and this can cause them to become isolated from family and peers.
The study that this session is predicated upon was designed to identify student populations most likely to suffer from one of these two conditions and determine effective means to lessen the effects on students at all educational levels.