This study seeks to theorize ‘the caring teacher’ in the context of the higher education environment. The study was carried out from the perspective of the teachers concerned and adopted an inductive interpretive paradigm and within this, used grounded theory processes and techniques. Emergent categories comprised: a relationship at the centre; compelled to care; caring as resistance; and finally, caring as less than. The four categories were combined in the construction of an integrative model to theorize the teacher in higher education who privileges caring within their pedagogy, from the perspective of the higher education teachers themselves.