The Bok Teaching Certificate gives GSAS PhD students a tangible marker of their ongoing commitment to developing as teachers in higher education. Guided by three principles—Learn, Practice, Reflect—those who pursue the Certificate explore different topics in teaching and learning through departmental pedagogy courses and Bok Seminars, reflect on their own teaching practice, and compile a portfolio of written materials documenting their experience. We offer a tailored approach for students; no two students follow...

Faculty and Teaching Fellows often are in an excellent position to identify students and colleagues who are struggling, and to refer them to the right person or department for help. And yet, at the same time, many instructors understandably report that they feel uncomfortable and/or unprepared in reaching out to a student or colleague in distress. After all, most of us are trained to be teachers and scholars, not mental health professionals.

Recognizing this challenge, the Bok Center recently collaborated with...

Planning the Fall Teaching Conference this summer felt like building an airplane while flying it: we knew we would be teaching in person, but the continually changing circumstances required us, like all instructors teaching this fall, to be intentional yet flexible in our planning. We had so many questions to consider: How should we prepare graduate student TFs to teach in physical classrooms? How could we most effectively apply the lessons we learned from our fully online conference in 2020 to this new “hybrid” moment of transition? How could we meet the needs of both new and experienced TFs facing another unprecedented semester?

... Read more about From Zoom Rooms to Classrooms: A Hybrid Fall Teaching Conference

Is there any document that does more, and receives less recognition, than the humble course syllabus? By comparison with the other documents scholars produce—journal articles, dissertations, even letters of recommendation—our syllabi hardly rate; they’re often regarded as ephemeral, purely functional, designed to be read once or twice and then cast aside at the end of the semester. But in fact, the syllabus is so much more than a reference document.... Read more about Exploring Syllabus Design