Teaching Hub LogoThe Teaching Hub is a collaborative center dedicated to empowering educators and advancing transformative, evidence-based teaching in support of student success. As a catalyst for academic excellence, the Hub aims to inspire curiosity, nurture confidence, and drive meaningful student success outcomes.

The Teaching Hub

  • Builds on educator expertise empowering faculty with strategic support, practical resources, and innovative tools to foster their growth.
  • Fosters creativity and community through multidisciplinary and cross-unit collaboration around the role of educators as teachers and mentors.
  • Takes on the most critical challenges in teaching and learning by standing up communities of practice to examine existing models and explore new pedagogical models, leading with evidence and experience in the creation of meaningful, impactful learning experiences in classrooms and online.
  • Provides one-on-one support for educators to help them meet the challenges of the fast-changing world of teaching and learning.
  • Supports the work of the Learning Institute and Curriculum Connector in the three-dimensional development of new strategies, policies, and practices that support student success.

The Teaching Hub recognizes that a broad array of individuals, from faculty, staff, and students, may serve as teachers to students, and we work to support all educators. The Hub will engage faculty, staff, and students through a series of opportunities:

  • Seminars featuring both external and internal experts
  • Individual and academic unit consultations
  • Professional development opportunities
  • Communities of practice
  • Community-building gatherings

Communities of Practice (CoP) are a signature mode of engagement within the Teaching Hub. Collectively, these will serve to create an intellectual nexus for curriculum and pedagogical design work at UNT and immediately engage a broad base of faculty and staff working together on projects identified as significant, timely challenges, or opportunities to increase student success.

Each CoP will be led by a faculty or staff member and can include small or large teams of additional educators. To support the work of these faculty, the Teaching Hub will provide a facilitator, a learning science consultant, and necessary data and story-telling support.

We envision a range of different genres for CoPs. Some CoPs may provide a gathering space for honest conversation and the opportunity to better understand the role of educators at UNT. Other CoPs might provide an informal structured process for educators in the early stages of exploring a challenge or opportunity. Other CoPs may provide more formal structure for educators testing out specific new pedagogical models and seeking to gather data on efficacy and student learning outcomes. CoPs may be as brief as a semester or last for multiple years.

Current Projects

We have a number of Communities of Practice that we are planning to launch this year, including:

  • Supporting Adjunct Faculty
  • Supporting Staff as Educators
  • Supporting Graduate Students as Educators
  • Teaching in the AI Era
  • Evaluating Impactful Teaching
  • Supporting Math Instruction 

Teaching Hub Leadership & Partners

The Teaching Hub is led by co-directors who bring a wealth of broad experience to their work: Dr. Amy Petros, from Chemistry in the College of Science, and Dr. Kathryn Raign, from English in the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences. They are joined by Dr. Yolanda Mitchell, who leads educational development in the Hub. Building on her leadership of faculty development within the Faculty Success Office, she supports and empowers educators across UNT.

Hub leaders are joined by a steering committee composed of faculty and staff from across the university who have relevant expertise that will provide a breadth of perspective and ensure involvement of different campus units. The steering committee members will help to shape the development, direction, goals, and practices of the units; prioritize projects and recruit participants; and oversee financial and human resources to best achieve meaningful impact.

Importantly, we do this work in partnership with the teams that provide faculty support in the Division of Strategic Education Alliances to create a “one-stop shop” for faculty and other educators at UNT. The Teaching Hub will act as an entry portal to help folks find the right expert or group of colleagues with whom they can best achieve their goals to support student success.

The Teaching Hub is—by the nature of its name alone—intended to be a unit that connects the many nodes of teaching expertise at UNT. In particular, we anticipate working closely with

Interested in Learning More?

Please contact us at teaching.hub@unt.edu.