Why communities of practice in higher education?

Members of the Faculty of Business CoP working together

Against the context of competing tensions within the current higher education environment in Australia, the CoP structure and approach provides a forum for staff to debate strategies to deal with these competing priorities and their impact on teaching and learning at the individual level.

Communities of practice specifically grow, or are fostered, to provide a shared space around shared concerns – in this case, the teaching and learning of first year course leaders in an Australian dual-mode university. Individual members of communities of practice face shared challenges provided by their student cohorts, their institutional context, and the challenges facing the wider higher education sector.

Benefits of CoPs at USQ

These shared challenges provide the basis for a common understanding between members, which at USQ has been further strengthened by the collaborative identification of priority issues to be addressed by the community.

Establishing and nurturing a shared sense of identity provides:

• the missing element in ensuring the institutional memory and sharing of teaching and learning practices
• a safe place for reflection and experimentation on teaching and learning for individual staff members.