New and Early Career Instructor Teaching Community
The New and Early Career Instructor Teaching Community (NECITC) aims to foster and accelerate success in teaching for eligible new and early career instructors. Over a three year sequence, participants will learn and discuss evidence-based teaching practices, create and form connections with instructors in different areas, and enjoy a space for reflection, iterative growth, and professional development.
The program is open to instructors who:
- Are in their first three years of teaching at the University of Rochester
- Are on a multi-year contract (e.g., tenure track, instructional track, lecturer, two-year visiting assistant professor, etc.)
- Teach courses that enroll students in the School of Arts & Sciences or Hajim School of Engineering & Applied Sciences
The goals of the community are to help early career instructors:
- Adopt evidence-based teaching practices
- Develop a network of colleagues with whom they feel comfortable discussing teaching
- Identify and articulate their personal teaching identity and goals, as well as the relationship of that identity and those goals to the norms of their department/program, school, UR, and their academic discipline
- Identify and utilize appropriate Teaching Center programming to support their teaching
- Assess and reflect on their own teaching as the basis for iterative improvement
- Document their teaching development for tenure and promotion
- Develop skills to support their evaluation of the teaching of others
Program Outline
This program is structured to take place over three years, with the bulk of the sessions in the first year, and declining time commitments over each of the three years:
Year One: Introduction to Teaching at Rochester:
- Six in-person meetings in both the fall and spring semester
- One Teaching Center service of choice
- Peer partnership with a colleague outside of your college/department
- Time commitment: 12–14-hours
Year Two: Develop Your Practice:
- Four in-person meetings in the fall semester only
- Mid- and end-of- semester check-in during the spring semester
- One non-evaluative, confidential Teaching Center class observation and post-observation meeting
- Time commitment:10-hours
Year Three: Document Your Teaching Effectiveness
- Four in-person meetings in the fall semester only
- Mid-semester check-in and end-of-program celebration in the spring semester
- One Teaching Center service of choice
- Time commitment: 8–10-hours
The Teaching Center will determine cohort meeting times each semester based upon participants’ schedules.
Additional Support
In addition to the New and Early Instructor Teaching Community, the Teaching Center offers a variety of programming, including workshops, consultations, cohorts, mid-semester observations, grants, and more. If you are not eligible for this community, please join us in our other programming.