Nexus for Faculty Success

The Nexus for Faculty Success is designed to cultivate a supportive, dynamic, and innovative learning community where educators can grow and thrive throughout their professional lifecycle. The Nexus provides a university-wide space to advance learning and teaching, academic writing and scholarship, and leadership in faculty, by supporting them in their development as inclusive and culturally-responsive educators, leaders, and scholars, as they prepare students to be effective health care professionals. The Nexus partners with schools on existing initiatives and collaborates on new strategies, centering diversity, equity, inclusion and justice in its evidence-based and reflective programs, services, and practices.

Current offerings

Leading as Faculty: Your Life in Discovery

This year-long program is designed to support participants in their understanding of the role of faculty in leading at the university from wherever they are, by:

• Approaching and evaluating continuous learning about the self and the perspective and growth of others with curiosity.
• Creating opportunities to deepen collaboration and experiment and building meaning around the ever changing challenges of the health and well-being of society.

The Nexus is currently partnering with a working group of faculty and staff from across the university to develop Inclusive Teaching Principles, which will inform new programming and support faculty and departments to create inclusive and equitable courses, curricula, and assessments. The Nexus also partners with the Master Teacher Guild and Women in Science and Health on their initiatives and programs.

Upcoming offerings

In 2023 - 2024, the Nexus will offer other key initiatives. These include:

1. The New Faculty Academy: This year-long program will support new faculty broadly in their teaching and learning, research and academic publication, and leadership, by introducing them to key resources, initiatives, and mentors from across the university, and creating a supportive space for them to thrive and succeed.
2. The Inclusive Teaching Practicum: This short and engaging course will be founded on RFUMS’ Inclusive Teaching Principles (in development) and will take an authentic and case-based approach to developing inclusive courses and creating inclusive learning environments The course will be co-created and co-facilitated by faculty and staff from across the university and will be designed for faculty across a broad range of disciplines and teaching contexts. Offered quarterly.
3. Academic Writing Learning Communities: The Nexus will offer (2) two-quarter learning communities (with writing retreats) that will be designed to support academic writing and manuscript preparation: The first is intended to support and motivate faculty who have completed their research already and are now seeking to tell the story of their data and submit the manuscript for publication. The other is intended for faculty who wish to develop an educational research project (scholarship of teaching and learning), and help them explore a key question related to their teaching and/or their students’ learning, design the study, and ultimately write up as a scholarly publication.

Meet the Team