University at Buffalo (UB)
Empowering Instructors | Supporting Excellence
The Office of Curriculum, Assessment and Teaching Transformation hosts Communities of Practice where you can share your best practices, tips and tricks to help create new knowledge to advance your teaching pedagogy and create inclusive learning environments for all. We encourage all members of the UB Community to share common concerns, problems and interests surrounding your teaching and research experience.
A Community of Practice (CoP) is a social phenomenon in which individuals, through their membership in a particular community or group, participate in an ongoing social practice of mastering skills and formulating personal identities to become a sustained member of such community (Lave & Wenger-Trayner,
1991).
There are three pillars of CoP (Lave & Wenger-Trayner, 2015):
UB Teaching and Learning Community of Knowledge, is a Community of Practice aimed to assist faculty with best pedagogical practices and classroom strategies.
Our Community of Practice meets via Zoom once per week to address teaching concerns, discuss classroom strategies and share resources along with best classroom strategies and practices suggested by you, for you. What better way to improve your teaching skills than by learning from fellow educators who have the same experiences as you. Utilizing resources found at UB always proves helpful, therefore our group invites and welcomes collaboration throughout UB.
The scholarship of teaching and learning (SOTL) is the systematic inquiry into student learning and teaching practices in higher education (Hutchings, P., & Shulman, L. S., 1999). UB SoTL is a Community of Practice for UB instructors to discuss current and future SOTL projects.
Our Community of Practice meets monthly to address SOTL projects, strategies, and practices.
The TA Discovery Community is a Community of Practice (CoP) aimed at supporting and developing UB’s teaching assistants, equipping them with best pedagogical practices and classroom strategies.