Join a Faculty Learning Community

Deadline to apply: January 26

This spring, the CTLA is launching several Faculty Learning Communities. As originally conceived by Milton Cox (2004), Faculty Learning Communities are designed for small, interdisciplinary groups of faculty to come together on a regular basis over a sustained period of time, with a focus on investigating and implementing new teaching and learning approaches. Faculty who participate in these communities often report a number of benefits, including developing lasting relationships with faculty in other departments, thinking deeply about their own pedagogical approaches, and developing new expertise.

For spring 2024, the CTLA will support up to 6 small Faculty Learning Communities focused on ELAC, particularly related to approaches for building students’ skills in each of the 5 learning outcomes. Each community will focus on one of the following:

• Teaching Communication
• Teaching Creativity
• Teaching Critical Thinking
• Teaching Ethical Reasoning
• Teaching Quantitative Literacy
• Creating ELAC courses focused on diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice

How Will the Faculty Learning Communities Work?

Each community will meet 4 to 6 times over the course of the semester (approximately every 3 weeks). Participants will explore their focus topic together, which will include identifying relevant material to read, preparing for meetings by reading agreed-upon material, and engaging in robust conversations during meetings. Over the course of the semester, members will individually reflect on how they will incorporate what they’ve learned into their own teaching. In addition, the group will collectively summarize key lessons learned in a brief document that will be made available to other faculty at Eastern.

Each Faculty Learning Community will be guided by a faculty facilitator who is responsible for coordinating meetings, facilitating shared content, communicating with the CTLA, and ensuring the group completes the shared document by May 31.

Benefits of Participating

• Build relationships with faculty from other disciplines who share a similar interest.
• Explore in depth a topic of interest and make plans for addressing the topic in your future teaching.
• Get feedback from peers on your ideas for implementing what you’re learning.
• Access resources to explore your topic in depth (e.g., CTLA funding to purchase a book for each participant to help guide the group’s discussions).
• Earn a $250 stipend (made possible, in part, through the Davis Educational Foundation).

Funding is available to support a maximum of 42 participants.

Apply to Participate in a Faculty Learning Community

To register your interest in participating, fill out the Faculty Learning Community Registration Form by January 26. Please note that membership is not guaranteed. If there are more registrants than spaces available, decisions will be made based on ensuring a diversity of disciplines and backgrounds, as well as whether individuals have overlap in available meeting time.