Community Building and Faculty Development: Reflections on a Teaching Portfolio Workshop
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Abstract
Faculty development is widely agreed upon as necessary and beneficial, particularly for newly hired academics. However, the demands on new faculty are exceedingly high, particularly to meet the needs of tenure. New faculty often lack collegial community and support, and experience stress and overwhelm while struggling to meet institutional demands. Building on previous studies positing that workshop participation rather than specific workshop content can foster faculty development, this reflective essay argues that a workshop aimed at meeting faculty members’ needs in the context of their institutions can help faculty development without unnecessarily increasing the burden on (new) faculty. Specifically, we reflect on our experiences participating in a Teaching Portfolio Workshop and argue that such a workshop can fulfill the dual purposes of meeting new faculty development needs and fostering community and can be particularly significant for developing faculty engagement in post-Covid academic institutions of higher education. We draw from the literature on communities of practice and teaching portfolios as well as our experiences as a group of new faculty at an urban commuter institution in a virtual Teaching Portfolio Workshop. We make recommendations for other institutions and faculty to develop similar workshops.
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