CTSE Communities of Practice
CTSE Communities of Practice (CoP)
(formerly Faculty and Professional Learning Communities (FPLCs))
CoP are groups of 8 to 10 people who meet regularly throughout the academic year to connect around a common teaching and learning interest with the goal of contributing knowledge in that area to the Suffolk community. Members can be faculty of any rank or appointment, staff, or administrators. CoP provide the time and space to come together, engage in discussions sparked by emerging ideas and practices in higher education, and develop an artifact or learning experience that can be shared with the larger Suffolk community. They aim to nourish a culture of reflecting on and investigating teaching and learning.
Propose a Community of Practice (CoP) topic for the 2024-2025 academic year
Call for CoP facilitators
The CTSE invites you to facilitate a 2024-2025 Community of Practice (CoP)! Are you excited about new strategies for engaging students? Are you looking to explore innovative pedagogies? Have you been wondering how to connect with Suffolk community members with diverse backgrounds and ideas? Here is your chance to co-create an engaged, supportive, intellectually creative community that will explore and grow together throughout the year.
Facilitators submit proposals for a specific topic relating to teaching and learning to the CTSE, and the CTSE works with facilitators to develop and hone their topics and recruit participants. The CoP meet regularly during the fall and spring semesters to explore their topics. They decide the learning activities they’ll engage in, the goals and values that will guide their inquiry, and the learning experience or artifacts they’ll create through their collaboration.
Any faculty person, staff member, or administrator can propose a CoP! It is a great way to create connections and fuel inspiration among Suffolk community members.
Possible list of CoP themes
Here are several suggested topics, but all ideas are welcome from potential facilitators.
- Guiding Students to Ethical and Appropriate Use of AI
- Improving Teaching through Peer Observation
- Learning about the Science of Learning
- Using Reflection to Deepen Learning
- Trauma-Aware Approaches to Teaching and Learning
- Well-Being for Educators
- Contemplative Pedagogy for Whole Person Education
- Increasing Equity, Access, and Belonging in the Suffolk Community
- Teaching and Learning in Virtual and Augmented Realities
Expectations for facilitators
Supported by the CTSE, facilitators provide leadership for their CoP in various ways:
- Attend a planning meeting for facilitators in August hosted by the CTSE to develop topics and brainstorm the learning activities, outcomes, and group culture that might guide their CoP;
- With their CoP participants, establish a regular meeting time, community norms, and other group parameters, help facilitate discussions and learning activities, and guide the production of an artifact or learning experience;
- Regularly communicate with group members and the CTSE;
- Get advance approval from the CTSE for budget expenditures;
- Attend a facilitators and participants meet and greet at the end of fall semester;
- Meet with the CTSE in the spring to discuss their presentations at the Symposium for Innovative Teaching and Learning;
- With CoP participants, produce a year-end reflection.
Propose a Community of Practice (CoP) topic for the 2024-2025 academic year
Call for CoP participants
All faculty, including part-time and adjunct faculty, staff, and administrators are warmly invited to participate. The more diverse the perspectives, the richer the interaction! The CTSE especially invites colleagues who have never participated in a CoP (FPLC) to submit ideas for facilitation.
Expectations for CoP participants
CoP participants are expected to
- Attend all meetings;
- Come to meetings prepared and engage fully in discussions and activities;
- Contribute fully to the CoP outcomes, including the production of an artifact or learning experience, a final report for the CTSE, and a generous, collegial community culture.
CoP participants are invited to attend a CTSE-hosted meet and greet at the end of fall semester.
Note. Final expectations and goals will be co-created by the group with the facilitator.
Benefits of participating in a CTSE Community of Practice
CoP offer participants an opportunity to listen deeply to other experts, exchange resources and experiences, and draw on the diverse perspectives of community members. Open, supportive, non-judgmental exchanges like CoP can deepen participants’ commitment to education, which has the potential to significantly benefit individual participants and the entire Suffolk community.
Sense of community has been defined as a “feeling that members have belonging, a feeling that members matter to one another and to the group, and a shared faith the members’ needs will be met through their commitment to be together” (McMillan & Chavis, 1986, p. 9). Milton Cox (2004) considers the following qualities essential to creating a felt sense of community: safety and trust, openness, respect, responsiveness, collaboration, relevance, challenge, enjoyment, esprit de corps, and empowerment.
Leading researchers on communities of practice, Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner (2015) distinguish communities of practice from less intentional communities: “In pursuing their interest in their domain, [CoP] members engage in joint activities and discussions, help each other, and share information. They build relationships that enable them to learn from each other; they care about their standing with each other.” CoP participants are practitioners who, through their sustained interactions, explore and develop not only a shared language and practice across disciplines, schools, and roles, but also a shared culture of respect and collegiality.
CoP Annual Budget
Each CoP is given an annual budget to be spent on resources or activities that directly support that CoP’s outcomes. Budget expenditures must be approved in advance by the CTSE.
Timeline for 2024-2025 process
| Task: | Due Date: |
| Announcement of Fall CoP program | May 14, 2024 |
| Facilitators’ Info Session (zoom) | May 21, 2024 |
| Facilitators’ Applications Due | May 28, 2024 |
| CTSE Advisory Board approves applications and notifies Facilitators | June 3, 2024 |
| CTSE invites participants to join a group | Mid-June to end of first week of fall semester |
| Facilitators’ Meeting | August TBD |
| First CoP Meeting | By October 15, 2024 |
| Participants Meet and Greet | Early December, 2024 |
| CTSE meets with facilitators regarding Symposium presentations | Mid-March, 2025 |
| Symposium presentations | Mid-May, 2025 |
| Final reports and reflections due | June 30, 2025 |
References
Cox, M.D. (2004), Introduction to faculty learning communities. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 2004: 5-23. https://doi.org/10.1002/tl.129
Mcmillan, David & Chavis, David. (1986). Sense of Community: A Definition and Theory. Journal of Community Psychology. 14. 6-23. 10.1002/1520-6629(198601)14:13.0.CO;2-I.
Wenger-Trayner, E. and Wenger-Trayner, B. (2015) An Introduction to Communities of Practice: A Brief Overview of the Concept and Its Uses. Available from authors at https://www.wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice.
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