Faculty Learning Community Objectives: * Audience: Our goal is to try to reach the wide teaching faculty across UT and (eventually) beyond. * Podcast Focus: We want to create a space and place for rich, complex dialogues about teaching for effective learning. * Podcast Goal: We want folks listening to leave with practical ideas that they can apply to their teaching. We want them to understand and believe that they are capable of making changes. It’s a step by step process. Hello My Name is Jen Moon. I’m an Associate Professor of Instruction in the College of Natural Sciences and a Provost’s Teaching Fellow. I’m Katie Dawson, an Associate Professor in the College of Fine Arts and Provost’s Teaching Fellow. I’m Stephanie Seidel Holmsten, Assistant Professor of Instruction in International Relations and Global Studies, and a Provost’s Teaching Fellow. And welcome to The Other Side of Campus, where we have conversations about teaching and learning, hosted by members of the Provost’s Teaching Fellows program at the University of Texas at Austin. So let’s get into it: the PTF program. Jen: About 7 years ago, our university’s Provost charged a task force with the goal of creating a sustainable structure to advance the teaching mission of the university. The Provost’s Teaching Fellows program began with an initial cohort of 20 faculty members. Katie: The mission of the Provost’s Teaching Fellows Program is to create and sustain a faculty community - faculty who are good enough teachers to know we could be better. The vision of the Provost’s Teaching Fellows program is to have a positive and sustained impact on the quality of teaching on campus. The program identifies, develops and supports talented, forward-thinking and service-oriented faculty dedicated to furthering innovative teaching. Stephanie: To join the program, faculty members pitch a two year project and once approved, receive funding for the project and a personal stipend. The projects are wide-ranging, from innovation in a particular classroom, like a Business class that gets access to real-life data to support student research to university-wide efforts like peer observation programs. After the two year projects, faculty members serve as mentors for new fellows for two more years, at least. Many of us hang around for more; We’re hooked! Katie: We also organize events and workshops that support faculty throughout university, whether they are a provost teaching fellow or not. Initiatives such as the New Faculty Symposium & Eyes on Teaching and ‘open house’ event inviting faculty to visit others’ classes and talk afterward about teaching. Jen: A common thread through all of this work is our eagerness to learn from each other. This takes the form of mentorship from start to finish. New fellows are mentored by senior fellows as they develop their projects. We come together as a group to talk about issues in education, we also workshop our projects, forming a cohort based on project themes, the members are from various colleges and may be at different stages of their work. Katie:The Provost’s Teaching Fellows program is a faculty learning community. And that’s our topic for today. Basically, a faculty learning community is a group that meets regularly to discuss issues around a central theme. Most faculty learning communities create spaces for meaningful conversations about teaching, learning and research. Steph: Yes, and we really leaned on this community during COVID.Teaching during COVID required a remarkable shift. We are learning about new technology; taping asynchronous lectures; designing collaborative learning for the virtual space. If you are like me, you feel like you are drinking from a fire hydrant trying to learn as much as I can as fast as I can about online teaching and learning. In the process of ramping up in new technology and new teaching techniques, many faculty members are feeling stressed, anxious and overwhelmed. Stephanie: Katie, you are our resident expert. You were one of the first faculty members to organize faculty learning communities at UT, and you spent years studying their impact and what makes them effective. Tell us a bit about your journey here. What sparked your interest in studying faculty learning communities? Katie: (talks about her interest in FLCs, and her initial FLC as her PTF project) Stephanie: Jen, tell us how you got involved. Jen: My interest started with a conference - two instructors - performance training - STEM 3 years on. My colleague, a PhD student in Theatre and Dance, Khristian Mendez and I have been running a 6 workshop series program with monthly cohort check ins for three years now. We invite faculty on campus to facilitate workshops on things like non verbal communication skills, presentation skills like using voice and stage presence. It’s basically a faculty learning community on teaching inclusively. Stephanie, you started an FLC in Global Classrooms. Tell us about that. Stephanie: I knew about your work with Jen, and how the FLC allowed faculty to play together around building a new skill. I was teaching a class with global virtual exchange and along with the awesome connections we made across the world, there were so many challenges with new tech, new class structure, an international partner. I needed space to brainstorm with others in my same situation. After being inspired by your work, I created a community for faculty teaching classes with global virtual exchange; a great cohort of people trying new things. So I designed the community to met three times to discuss: learning objectives, collaborative projects, and reflection and assessment. In the end faculty leaned on each other so much that we ended up meeting four more times, each time discussing real-time challenges that one of us was facing, sharing resources and talking through possible solutions. Jen: So, I noticed we all have themes and structure. I imagine these great outcomes don’t come naturally, but are nurtured. What makes for an effective faculty learning community? What does an FLC need to be successful? Stephanie: What ruins a faculty learning community? What is the kryptonite of FLCs? Katie: What benefits do they bring? Thanks everyone!