The authority associated with instructor-student relationships is the most immediate force present from the first day of class. Though the presentation of that authority varies depending on personal teaching style, there’s nevertheless a conscious representational difference that invisibly guides classroom etiquette. There are exceptions, of course, but for the most part students sit down on the first day of class and await information to be transferred over to them. As an instructor, I have both the immediate and longterm opportunity to change how this transference operates, and that serves as a distinct kind of power that is inaccessible to students, and they are simultaneously subject to it. It’s in my control, as well, to decide whether to alter that inaccessibility, or allow for student feedback that becomes essential to the evolution of how class is run. That I have the power to change (most of) this is a valuable difference, but that that option falls under my discretion can be equally damaging, as I’m accountable for my own actions and don’t have a constant second person of equal positional power beside me at all times when I’m teaching.

On a more surface level, though, I’m just at a different stage in my life than my students. I’ve graduated from college, I’m older than them (at least, as far as I know), I come from a different part of the country (they’re all from Washington), and I am constantly, physically positioned opposite to them in front of the class. Again, there’s a duality of valuable and damaging qualities to all of this; the surface level differences allow for a greater exchange of ideas in virtually any classroom circumstance. Also in my control is how much I allow for this circulation and exchange to take place, whether I allow personal questions like where I’m from or how old I am, whether to risk that potentially useful or insightful dialogue in which I learn more about my students as people. The question of whether is it potentially harmful to learn more about your students as people is always hanging over me, as well. Because though that exchange can be rich and supplementary to what we’re discussing in class, it can also lessen my authority as an instructor, which is necessary to a conducive classroom.