This is no easy task because in some larger sense the teacher is clearly responsible for the class. Yet, attempting to exert authority and control can clearly stand in the way of class learning. This preoccupation with performance, as well as the traditional in locus parentis attitude that the professor knows the students' interests best, work against the development of student initiative and autonomy. Comfortable routines and the instructor's convenience can easily trump the good of the student. Resolution is to be found in the hospitality that is open to the other but does not deny anyone's identity and experience.
Hospitable instructors use the strengths of their personality in the service of student learning.
This is the middle way between the nondirective presence of one kind of instructor and the rigid authoritarianism or performance orientation of another. Hospitality and the Covenantal Community Teachers have a position of trust-a fiduciary responsibility for advancing the welfare and good of the student, not their own good. Being hospitable is another way of speaking of this responsibility. It points us toward, and helps create, the covenantal, not the contractual, community. The covenantal relationship involves committing with others to a common good, promoted through open exchange and reciprocity.