Faculty Learning Communities

2021–22 Faculty Learning Communities

21-22 Topics

• Creating Opportunities for Under-Resourced and Post-Traditional Students

• Return to Campus and Building a Resilient Learning Community

• Faculty Learning Community for Undergraduate Leaders

Specific topics, readings, and goals are set by FLC members, aided by a peer facilitator.

2020–21 Faculty Learning Communities

2020–21 Topics

• Teaching Difficult Topics
• Remote Teaching
• Fostering Inclusive Classrooms
• Teaching Scholars Learning Community for Early-Career Faculty (cohort-based: for faculty, including teaching faculty in their first 6 years of teaching)
• Learning Community for Undergraduate Leaders (cohort-based: for current Undergraduate Directors/Undergraduate Chairs)

Specific topics, readings, and goals are set by FLC members, aided by a peer facilitator.

In recognition of the current moment of reckoning with racial injustice in America, the Office of Undergraduate Education will encourage each community to spend some time discussing issues of diversity, inclusion, and anti-racism as they relate to the FLC topic.

2019-2020 Faculty Learning Communities

Students in Transition

Students arrive at Rutgers from myriad educational systems and learning experiences. Whether from a New Jersey high school, a community college, or a secondary school in another country, our students must complete a challenging transition into a new learning environment rich in differing terminologies, course structures, and academic goals.

If you're a faculty member who teaches, mentors, or advises students transitioning to Rutgers, this Faculty Learning Community will connect you to colleagues with similar experiences and goals to understand what others are already doing, to consider scholarly research on student transition, and to explore the best use of student support services and programs. We hope you will join so that we might work to share and align language, learning goals, and instructional approaches to simplify and support student transition to Rutgers.

The community will be facilitated by Dr. Gregg Transue, Director of Introductory Biology Programs in the Division of Life Sciences (including General Biology and the Gateway course Preparation for General Biology). Gregg oversees the instruction of more than 2,000 new students each semester. He is a seabird ecologist who has been involved with introductory biology students and courses at Rutgers since 1982.

Writing in the Disciplines

Writing remains a challenge, even for many of our best students. As students advance in a discipline, this challenge grows: in addition to the mechanics of writing and basic critical thinking skills, students must master discipline-specific conventions for writing and reasoning, integrate what they’re learning, and understand how to reach the academic or professional audience they’re writing for.

Facilitated by Professors Kristen Syrett and Crystal Akers of Linguistics, this Learning Community will bring together a diverse group of faculty to explore the variety of approaches taken at Rutgers to teaching disciplinary writing; identify research-based strategies for developing students’ disciplinary writing skills; and think about how and when to incorporate disciplinary writing into program curricula.