Papers by Leah P . Hollis
The Department Chair, 2024
D uring the Thanksgiving 2023 holiday, academics and Americans alike enjoyed a much-needed respit... more D uring the Thanksgiving 2023 holiday, academics and Americans alike enjoyed a much-needed respite from our harried lives. However, in our increasingly interconnected global society, not everyone enjoyed a peaceful week. I am referring to the impact of the Hamas terrorist group that attacked the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023. According to ABC News, Hamas murdered more than 1,200 people and injured another 6,900 (Frayer 2023). An additional 200 to 250 people were taken hostage. To be clear, El Deeb (2023) wrote, "The group [Hamas] was founded in 1987 by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, [and] has vowed to annihilate Israel and has been responsible for many suicide bombings and other deadly attacks on civilians and Israeli soldiers. The U.S. State Department has designated Hamas a terrorist group in 1997. The European Union and other Western countries also consider it a terrorist organization." Faculty and academics are continuously left contemplating how to react or respond to a wartime crisis that envelopes campus colleagues and students. The seven-day ceasefire in late November 2023 led to the release of hostage Abigail Edan. She is a beautiful, bright-eyed little Jewish girl who saw her mother murdered and then fled to her father, who was gunned down while she was in his arms. According to news reports, she crawled out from under his bloody body and ran to a house, only to be among those taken hostage. Abigail's horrendous story and those of others taken hostage are juxtaposed with hate crimes against both Palestinians and Jews in the United States. Fall break ended with three Palestinian twentyyear-old men, Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdel Hamid, and Tahseen Ahmed, being gunned down in an apparent hate crime just outside the University of Vermont. They were simply taking a quiet walk while donning a keffiyeh, the traditional Middle Eastern black-and-white checkered scarf. Amid generational trauma that affects the Jewish and Palestinian communities, academic communities scramble to offer a response. With powerful donors pulling support from Harvard University and The University of Pennsylvania because they claim universities are tiptoeing through their institutional response to Hamas, academics from adjuncts to associate provosts generally feel they must walk a tightrope in conversations about the October terrorist attacks that instigated the Israel-Hamas War (Meyersohn 2023). On campus, academics are faced with navigating Israeli and Palestinian perspectives. The post-World War II 1948 creation of Israel is at the inception of such multiple realities, with the Arabs rejecting the two-state solution. A war ensued as Jews were motivated by their history in which six million Jews were slaughtered during
Taboo: The Journal of Culture and Education, 2021
Despite the profound academic and professional achievements among Black women, the intersection o... more Despite the profound academic and professional achievements among Black women, the intersection of race and gender in higher education remains inescapable. Black female tenure-track and tenured professors at predominantly white institutions (PWIs) commonly experience challenges; however, the challenges Black women confront at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) are not publicly discussed. Using critical race and feminist theories, which is critical race feminism, the purpose of this study is to explore the intersections of race and gender among Black female tenure-track professors working at PWIs and HBCUs. Nine semi-structured interviews were conducted with Black female tenure-track and tenured professors at HBCUs and PWIs. The results highlight that Black women continue to experience exploitative and oppressive conditions regardless of their educational attainment, academic successes, or institutional locale.
Journal for the Study of Postsecondary and Tertiary Education, 2019
Aim/Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to apply Albert Bandura’s findings of the Bobo Doll exp... more Aim/Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to apply Albert Bandura’s findings of the Bobo Doll experiments to organizational behavior and workplace bullying in higher education. The Bandura social psychological experiments confirm that people who see aggression also need to witness an intervention to aggression to learn that the organization does not welcome aggression in their work environment. Background: By applying the Bandura experiment, the researcher shows how leadership can intervene to stop organizational aggression and abuse. Without leadership intervention, workplace bullying continues in higher education. Methodology: The researcher used a data set of 730 higher education professionals. The central research question: RQ Which personnel, bullied or not bullied, are more likely to report that no intervention was demonstrated in the organization’s response to reports of workplace bullying on campus? A chi-square analysis was used to examine if organizational inaction was mor...
Taboo, 2023
Workplace bullying impacts 58-62% of higher education faculty and administrators with the percent... more Workplace bullying impacts 58-62% of higher education faculty and administrators with the percentage being higher for underrepresented minority (URM) colleagues. I often serve as an educational consultant who has helped over 350 colleges and universities cope with workplace bullying, microaggressions, and discrimination. In turn, I am in a rare position to follow the experiences of Ridley Price, a URM professor who endured malicious bullying for over six years. Meanwhile, their institution sat idly by and enabled the bullies. In this context, the narrative reflecting Ridley Price’s bullying and mobbing experiences embraces Freire’s theoretical approach regarding oppressed populations. The narrative
chronicles Professor Price’s protracted abuse, the institutional betrayal that enabled the bullies, and the impact on Ridley’s health. In addition to documenting the depth of Ridley’s bullying and harassment experiences, this narrative also includes practical strategies to offset the severe health problems which developed at the hands of the mob, identified as Dean Ty and Company.
SAGE Open, 2015
Workplace bullying has a detrimental effect on employees, yet few studies have examined its impac... more Workplace bullying has a detrimental effect on employees, yet few studies have examined its impact on personnel in American higher education administration. Therefore, two central research questions guided this study: (a) What is the extent of workplace bullying in higher education administration? and (b) What is the cost of workplace bullying specifically to higher education administration? Participants from 175 four-year colleges and universities were surveyed to reveal that 62% of higher education administrators had experienced or witnessed workplace bullying in the 18 months prior to the study. Race and gender were not parameters considered in the sample. A total of 401 ( n = 401) higher education respondents completed the instrument from various departments on a campus: academic affairs, student affairs, athletics, development/advancement, admissions/financial aid, information technology, arts faculty, sciences faculty, and executives. Employment disengagement served as the the...
Comparative Civilizations Review, 2020
After touring Havana, Cuba, with a group of African American Scholars in the fall of 2019, I am i... more After touring Havana, Cuba, with a group of African American Scholars in the fall of 2019, I am inspired to identify the subtle and explicit racist experiences that we endured. A common message from those in the tourism industry is that Cubans love African Americans. This message was constant, yet it rang like a gong in our ears because the message did not match the treatment we received. In truth, this love was not for the African aspect of our identities but for the financial prosperity in the American part of our identities. The Cuban tour guide constantly announced the propaganda publicly that when Castro came to power in 1959 the government formally abolished racism. However, the undercurrent of racism saturated our visit. Proclaiming racism is abolished does not make it so; instead, the proclamation was an ostrich’s head in the sand. The obvious was ignored for the postulated utopian racial harmony indoctrination. Eradication of racism or other ‘isms’ involves a trajectory of ...
In response to fluctuating budgets and enrollments, higher education has come to depend less on a... more In response to fluctuating budgets and enrollments, higher education has come to depend less on a full-time faculty and to rely increasingly on less expensive part-time faculty. Further,the House Committee (2014) reports that adjuncts are the majority of faculty across all sectors of higher education. Specifically, only 31.3% of public 2-year faculty members are full-time (Kezar & Maxey, 2013).Concurrently, the Obama administration recommended that 60% of Americans hold a degree by 2020; in turn, with less institutional commitment to fulltime faculty, adjuncts are the central teaching resource in the midst of achieving this national standard. Within this context, this study’s central question is “What is the significance of full-time faculty for community college student retention/graduation?” Individual bivariate correlation tests revealed a weak relationship yet no statistical significance between the percentage of full-time faculty and community college student retention and grad...
Comparative Civilizations Review, 2018
This essay argues that while harassment and aggression are continually present in the postmodern ... more This essay argues that while harassment and aggression are continually present in the postmodern cyberspace age, such behaviors have been present within humanity throughout both modern and postmodern periods. During modernity, a privileged few controlled expression and aggression. However, the postmodern period’s fractured state, which often sidesteps empathy and human frailty, has unleashed largely unfettered aggression en masse on the Internet. In short, many, not a privileged few, express aggression. This essay will consider some historical examples of controlled aggression in the modern period. Then the essay will compare how postmodern aggression is more prolific, as the public must witness and participate in aggressive, constant self-expression. Communication controls civilization, its rules and structures. Gurevitch and Blumler (1990) remarked that communication was structured by a few media outlets and manipulated by a web of powerful political and economic influences. Conse...
Few studies have examined the extent of workplace bullying in American higher education; however,... more Few studies have examined the extent of workplace bullying in American higher education; however, a 2012 study confirmed that 62% of respondents (n=401) were affected by workplace bullying 18 months prior to the study (Hollis 2012). A closer examination of the women respondents (n=281) revealed that 71% of the women in this subset faced workplace bullying. Women respondents were also more likely to seek structural solutions, such as reporting bullying to their immediate supervisors or human resources staff. Workplace bullying is couched in power. Those with power control tenure and promotion as well as resources; they can also hinder women from obtaining leadership positions. However, without policy or legislation, incivility is governed by the personal discretion of workplace leaders. As workplace bullying typically emerges from a power differential, Bolman and Deal’s (2013) theories regarding organizational structure and politics serve as the theoretical lens for this study. This ...
Comparative Civilizations Review, 2017
According to Freud, civilization is meant to protect humans from the forces of nature, to protect... more According to Freud, civilization is meant to protect humans from the forces of nature, to protect human frailty; but then, paradoxically, it falls short of such protection by its lack of concomitant regulation (1991). In fact, civilized service to society, delivered via organizations, creates strife and anxiety. While civilization is a structure created to protect people from nature and to support a frail humanity, its rules and power structures yield aggression, spawning the need for people to control each other (Freud & Strachey, 1991). Such control and the power structures that arise within organizations can be considered the root of workplace bullying, aggression, and incivility in our putatively civilized structures of work. Consequently, global researchers strive to make sense of incivility within civilization, a structure that generates aggravation although it was originally developed to provide protection. Northern Europeans have led research efforts to analyze the psycholog...
Comparative Civilizations Review, 2017
IntroductionThe purpose of this paper is to compare the probable existence of two North American ... more IntroductionThe purpose of this paper is to compare the probable existence of two North American civilizations, Canada and the United States, and then consider how each civilization has addressed workplace bullying. Canada started to prohibit workplace bullying in 2004. However, the United States only began to address the problem ten years later, in 2014, with a few states passing statutes. Examining the differences in culture and the research on how higher education in both Canada and the United States has dealt with workplace bullying may give insights to how both Canada and the United States can better protect employees faced with workplace bullying.Brief Definition of CivilizationMany varying and competing definitions of the controversial concept of 'civilization' exist in the literature. However, Permumpanani (2013), writing with the Comparative Civilization Review, defined civilization as a "dynamic system that supports endogenous cultural development through econ...
Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 2017
Previous studies have confirmed that American higher education professionals endure workplace bul... more Previous studies have confirmed that American higher education professionals endure workplace bullying at a rate higher than the general population. Close to two-thirds of American higher education employees were affected by workplace bullying and often endure the bullying at least two to three years. While the frequency of workplace bullying has been examined, along with the corresponding cost of employee disengagement, an analysis of how higher education employees cope with the stress of workplace bullying is absent from the literature. Within the theoretical stress and coping frameworks, this essay examined how higher educational personnel cope with stressful workplace bullying. A chi-square analysis was utilized on a sample (n=355) of American higher education respondents to determine the difference of the gender for respondents' reactions. The chi-square analysis showed that women were more likely to quit/resign from a job in reaction to workplace bullying, and men are more likely to take more sick time in response to workplace bullying.
European Journal of Educational Research, 2017
Instrument design is a powerful research approach to answer questions on a unique research topic.... more Instrument design is a powerful research approach to answer questions on a unique research topic. If the design was crafted to gather demographic information, and included open-ended remarks from respondents, the instrument could gather data that could be used in primary and secondary analyses on the same topic. Further, the quantitative data could establish independent and dependent variables for statistical tests, while the open-ended questions could garner qualitative data. This researcher created a 35-question instrument on workplace bullying for American higher education and conducted a study on 142 American community colleges. The findings revealed that 64% of respondents endured workplace bullying (Hollis, 2016). This data set supported several book chapters that included descriptive statistics, chi-square analysis, and qualitative data from the respondents. Further, by using the demographic data, the researcher was able to conduct a variety of analyses regarding workplace bullying and the association in community colleges involving race, gender, and sexual orientation. This practical essay will discuss insight to instrument development including a reflection on the literature review that informed the instrument design.
Journal of Applied Communication Research, 2020
Workplace bullying is a pernicious workplace problem that harms employees and organizations alike... more Workplace bullying is a pernicious workplace problem that harms employees and organizations alike. Targets suffer mental and physical consequences of repeated abuse. Organizations experience consequences such as diminished worker productivity and increased turnover. In some cases, even workplace violence. While these instances are thankfully rare, it is important to understand how workplace bullying manifests in organizations and what employees, bystanders, and organizations can do about it. At the invitation of the editor to convene a diverse panel of experts on workplace bullying, seven scholars responded to questions pertaining to six workplace bullying-related issues. These are conceptual definition; bystander intervention; the relationship between race, gender, and other marginalized identities and workplace bullying; interdisciplinary opportunities and constraints; developments in United States policy; and how employees, bystanders, and organizations can and should respond to workplace bullying.
Journal of Black Sexuality and Relationships, 2023
I am pleased to bring this special edition o Title IX and Black women to fruition for the 50th an... more I am pleased to bring this special edition o Title IX and Black women to fruition for the 50th anniversary of Title IX. This legislation has empowered millions of women in sports and cultivated a more in-depth interest for women in the STEM field. As I reflect on Title IX and other legislation designed to provide equal rights or women, I will also grapple with the new challenge to Title IX, the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization law suit which led to the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and women's federally protected reproductive rights in the June 2022. Though women have made strides in college sports participation, the threat to reproductive rights will disproportionately compromise low income college age women who strive to enhance their social economic class through education.
De Gruyter eBooks, Aug 22, 2022
Research Anthology on Combating Cyber-Aggression and Online Negativity
School-level bullying and workplace bullying are globally recognized as threats to organizational... more School-level bullying and workplace bullying are globally recognized as threats to organizational productivity, emotional safety, psychological wellness, and overall morale. Consequently, some countries have instituted legislation to prohibit bullying at various levels in society. This essay will proceed from two vantage points. First, workplace bullying will be addressed, considering the cost to organizations and individuals. Second, school bullying will be addressed with an examination of the bully as a threat to the school's reputation and individual student welfare. Further, cyberbullying affects both children and adults. Therefore, the purpose of this essay is to consider policy development for international leaders who are managing both students and professional educators.
Handbook of Academic Integrity. Springer, Singapore., 2023
The COVID-19 pandemic, which started compromising education in March 2020, precipitated the most ... more The COVID-19 pandemic, which started compromising education in March 2020, precipitated the most extreme educational disruption in over a century. For over 2 years,all levels of education shuttered in-person educational delivery and instituted online education. Many faculty members were teaching online for the first time and thus were distracted by the stress of switching instructional modalities. Students found themselves in a panic-filled transition in which they had little guidance for how to engage with online education as their faculty struggled. One of the residual impacts of this abrupt shift was the explosion in contract cheating, in which students pay a third party to complete homework assignments, take exams, and compose papers. The contract cheating issue is a global problem, with institutions reporting double- and triple-digit spikes in online cheating as the pandemic ensued. Additionally, some of the literature confirms that contract cheating does not meet cheaters’ objectives, given the substandard and tardy work that is often produced. Therefore, this chapter will examine not only the proliferation of contract cheating during the pandemic but other critical elements that result in unfortunate residuals. Plagiarism, academic misconduct, and online cheating, including colleges and universities revoking degrees, led to legal actions. Further, while affluent students and their parents may seek out and purchase ghost students’ services, students with less money find themselves unwittingly competing inequitable conditions.
De Gruyter Handbook of Organizational Conflict Management, 2022
Workplace bullying is most like a prolonged, intractable, escalating destructive conflict between... more Workplace bullying is most like a prolonged, intractable, escalating destructive conflict between people with a power differential (Keashly et al., 2020), the most difficult of conflicts to manage and resolve. It is grounded in and fueled by the organization through its policies, practices, procedures, work structure, and labor relations; in essence, workplace bullying is reflective of organizational culture and climate. Thus, while bullying may manifest at the interpersonal level, it is a systemic organizational issue. The approach for addressing bullying thus needs to recognize this embedded and progressive nature, be multi-faceted and involve a coordinated and simultaneous purposeful effort at the individual, unit/team, and organizational levels. A proactive and comprehensive approach to addressing workplace bullying is critical and urgent and a conflict management system perspective is useful in this consideration. In this chapter, we offer a brief primer on the nature and dynamics of workplace bullying. We then take an organization-level perspective on approaches for possible resolution, highlighting the critical role of policy design and implementation.
Uploads
Papers by Leah P . Hollis
chronicles Professor Price’s protracted abuse, the institutional betrayal that enabled the bullies, and the impact on Ridley’s health. In addition to documenting the depth of Ridley’s bullying and harassment experiences, this narrative also includes practical strategies to offset the severe health problems which developed at the hands of the mob, identified as Dean Ty and Company.
chronicles Professor Price’s protracted abuse, the institutional betrayal that enabled the bullies, and the impact on Ridley’s health. In addition to documenting the depth of Ridley’s bullying and harassment experiences, this narrative also includes practical strategies to offset the severe health problems which developed at the hands of the mob, identified as Dean Ty and Company.
affecting their mental health negatively and hence their career progression. In this interdisciplinary text, Hollis combines the fields of intersectionality and workplace bullying to present a balanced offering of conceptual essays and empirical research studies. The chapters explore how researchers have previously used empirical studies to address race and gender before arguing that the more complex an identity or intersectional position, such as being a Black gender fluid woman, the more likely a person shall experience workplace bullying. The author also looks at how this affects Black women's mental health, such as through increased anxiety, depression, insomnia, and self-medicating behaviors, before looking specifically at Black female athletes as a study, the topic of colorism at work and its impact on Black women, and how workplace bullying compromises organizations diversity and inclusion initiatives.
This book will be of immense interest to graduate students and academics in the fields of social work, ethnic studies, Black studies, Africana studies, gender studies, political science, sociology, psychology, and social justice. It will also be of interest to those interested in intersectionality and how this relates to race and gender of women.
https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003187813/black-women-intersectionality-workplace-bullying-leah-hollis
The book is available on amazon.com or the Emerald website. Chapters are available individually at Emerald.
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/S1479-364420160000018020
https://rrapp.hks.harvard.edu/complex-intersectionality-compounds-workplace-bullying-for-women-of-color/
These findings were presented at the RCMI Conference, Bethesda, MD December 16 2019
While researchers have brought attention to direct bullying, vicarious bullying—which results when a third party acts as the aggressor or henchman—can also create destructive environments that lead to employee disengagement and turnover. This study is based on a meta- analysis of existing data sets pertaining to workplace bullying in American higher education. Potential respondents at 317 four-year colleges and universities, as well as two-year community colleges, received a 35- question instrument.
attention from researchers since the early
2000s. Reflecting on the primary sample of
200 community college respondents who
confirmed that 64% of respondents were
affected by workplace bullying (Hollis 2016),
this analysis used descriptive statistics to
answer the question, “what is the extent of
community college women affected by
workplace bullying?” After it was determined
that 36% of the general sample, primarily
women, avoided bullying, a second question
emerged: “What are common traits of those
NOT bullied in community colleges? ”
This analysis shows that race, gender, and
position are factors that seemingly contribute
to who avoids bullying. Considering theories
regarding social dominance (Pratto, et al.,
1994, Sidanius, 1993) and constrained choice
(Broadbridge, 2010; Hakim, 2002), the data
revealed that those who are not bullied tend to
be white, women, in middle management,
without tenure. In short, those who do not
seek power and work from traditional
positions are more likely to avoid bullying.
Further, only 6% of the people of color
reported they were unaffected by
workplace bullying. These respondents of
color all held positions without power in the
community college structure.
Why attend?
Interact with the top workplace bullying experts in the country
Learn what other colleges are doing.
Gain insight into addressing bullying at your institution.
It's a free event
Space is limited, so registration is required
UNDERSTANDING VULNERABLE EMPLOYEES’ EXPERIENCES. Discount code will be available at the event