The Role of Caring Instructors in Postgraduate Education: Perceptions and Experiences of TEFL Postgraduate Students and Instructors

Studying the role teacher care performs in education is necessary to address the human aspects of teaching. However, TEFL postgraduates have been a neglected cohort in most of the previous studies of teacher care. Therefore, this study investigated the role of caring teachers in TEFL postgraduate education based on the perceptions and experiences of postgraduate instructors and students. Accordingly, 20 students, both MA and PhD, and 6 postgraduate instructors were selected, through purposive sampling, from two state universities in Tehran. Conducting semi-structured interviews with both groups, data were collected and analyzed within the framework of interpretive phenomenological analysis (IPA), as a qualitative paradigm. Due to the complex and contextual nature of teacher care as an abstract concept and still under-researched in TEFL, IPA was employed to provide an in-depth understanding about the role of caring TEFL instructors in postgraduate education. The findings revealed that caring instructors could perform a key role in strengthening postgraduates’ motivation and therefore enhancing their academic performances, creating a stress-free and peaceful learning environment, inspiring them to make transformative decisions in their lives, and their learning how to care in academic settings. This research has implications for instructors, teacher educators, and policy makers seeking to establish moral education at TEFL postgraduate level.