Academic Resilience

The pressures brought about by the COVID-19 global pandemic in 2020 have amplified the significance of academic resilience and highlight the importance of a shared insights into academics' experiences. The responses to academic work within this context has received little research attention despite its universality during the pandemic. Failing to recognise, or ‘invisibilising’ the roles and needs of academics during a pandemic, is a significant concern. This chapter explores this uncharted terrain, and presents stories of resilience – being a postdoc in a foreign country (de los Reyes), negotiating (yet another) contract (Mahat), navigating research in a different context (Cohrssen), and digital engagement in academia (Blannin) – from academics in different career stages and global contexts. These stories provide points of reflection for those navigating the complex world of academia during these uncertain times.

During the rapid transition online, university educators had to reconsider how they supported students with disabilities and neurological differences in accessing a high-quality remote learning experience. This chapter explores my personal experiences as an Early Career Academic (ECA) tasked with supporting our faculty during the transition to remote learning. By collating my personal experiences leading up to and throughout this period, I reflect on my own coping strategies required to fulfill this role. I also explore the forms of resilience that I utilised to support my colleagues who had a spectrum of perspectives and knowledge of inclusive digital pedagogies.

As the COVID-19 pandemic halted international travel for most academics and both seminars and symposia took place online, this chapter seeks to show three examples where academic cooperation within Latin American Studies allowed research dissemination successfully. Academics have had to show resilience by showcasing their research remotely. This has clear advantages despite the drawback of lacking face-to-face networking opportunities. Considerations such as reduced costs and wider participation; immediacy; commitment and passion; trust and autonomy; and infrastructure are central to understanding how international academic cooperation works and prove that scholars can present their new findings with their colleagues while keeping physical distance.

The pandemic has changed our work schedule and everyday routine. As a researcher, I found this time to be challenging both professionally and personally. This chapter includes some of those challenges and highlights how I overcame them. It took me time to find solutions to new complexities that emerged in my work life due to the pandemic. After almost two years in the pandemic I am able to look back and identify how the institution supported us and how I self-motivated and pushed myself to keep going and work towards my goals.

The unpredictability of the COVID-19 pandemic gripped the world and now, over a year later, people are still coming to terms with the mayhem caused by this deadly virus. To curb the spread of the coronavirus, the South African government instituted stringent lockdown measures such as intermittent closure of universities. To resume the academic programme, universities advocated the transition from face-to-face teaching to online teaching. This posed serious challenges for academic staff who were compelled to make sacrifices so that students could receive quality education. This chapter explored the resilience of three academics who made paradigm shifts to their teaching practice.

This is a story of collective resilience. In a two-week task force, our group of Associate Professors created the SOS-MSME project, an advisory network to support Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises suffering the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost 1,000 people, including staff, students from different university, faculties, alumni, and professionals from the community engaged in this project supporting more than 200 entrepreneurs. It has helped our community, but also ourselves generating a new challenging academic path integrating service, research and teaching.

This chapter discusses the opportunities and challenges for academics engaging with civic engagement initiatives within higher education settings. Situating civic engagement as part of the current academic portfolio and broader demands of the university context, it explores the dynamics involved in these activities by drawing on the case of one rapid response initiative involving students and staff working on the design and delivery of an intergenerational digital mentoring project. In reflecting on four questions that emerged during the initiative, it considers the practicalities of negotiating civic engagement within the context of the university and academic careers more broadly.

In this penultimate chapter, we link the key themes on academic resilience to the changing context of the academic workforce around the world. We provide provocations for individual academics and institutional leaders to reflect on the complexities of the academic landscape and academic identity regardless of contexts and adversities. We include in this chapter powerful reflections for academics and institutions to build academic resilience by tapping into structural or institutional resources, collective solidarities, and personal resources. By offering these reflections, we hope our readers – individuals and institutions – will reflect on strategies to navigate the changing and unstable terrains of academia.

Academics around the world continue to demonstrate strength to overcome the initial hurdles of COVID-19. But resilient academics show sustained engagement despite the continuing changes and uncertainties during these ongoing challenging times. In this concluding chapter, we synthesise the key takeaways from each chapter – narratives that may support academics at every career stage to feel energised, motivated and inspired in times of adversity. We share critical insights and strategies that may assist academics forge ahead in a post-pandemic world. In doing so, we advance the Academic Resilience Model that may help academics – and institutions – thrive in times of adversity.