ABSTRACT
Every semester while teaching a required course in social foundations of education, I engage three categories of students. There are those willing to walk down the path of critical thinking with me, who find their worldviews shattered, but simultaneously engage in creatively rebuilding a sense of meaning and coherence in the face of ambiguity. Secondly, there are those who angrily and vocally resist my attempts to suggest that the world might possibly be other than they have comfortably experienced it. Third, there are those who appear disaffected, already sufficiently numb so that my attempts to ask them to rethink the world encounter only vacant and dull stares. While I should probably be most concerned about those with blank and vacant faces, I am given the hope and inspiration to go on by those who embrace the opportunity to rethink the dominant propaganda that has constituted the majority of their education thus far. However, it is often the case that the most intense emotions of suffering are experienced by both myself and the students who loudly resist having their worldviews challenged. How can educator and student make productive use out of this suffering and discomfort? What role does compassion play in helping negotiate the minefields of ambiguity and contradiction encountered when asked to rethink worldviews?
