TREC Communities of Practice Description
The TREC Communities of Practice (CoP) meetings will begin in August/September. Please make sure to Sign-up for a CoP before the end of September!
The TREC Communities of Practice (CoP) are a year long program. Each CoP listed below will meet once a month either in person, virtually or a combination of the two. These CoPs are led by TREC Teacher Leaders (Cohort 3). Please read below to find out more about the individual CoPs!
TREC Community of Practice Definition:
- Through TREC CoPs regional educators will build community while deepening their knowledge, understanding, and expertise to better support their passion for the teaching profession and student success (adapted from Wenger, McDermott, and Synder, 2002).
Benefits of Joining a COP:
- Collaborative Learning on area of passion
- Networking with regional educators including TREC Teacher Leaders
- Recertification Hours available (via certificate)
- Book included for book-based COPs
TREC Communities of Practice 2022-2023
Ride the Waves of Change:
The focus of our COP will be: Ride the Waves of Change (April) & The Spheres of Influence: What can you control? What can you Influence? What is Outside of your control or influence? This is for teachers that want to work on identifying the Spheres of Influence & learn how to handle change in a healthy manner.
Book: Onward by Elena Aguilar
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader Ellen Floyd
Meeting Times: Third Tuesday of the month, 4:00 – 5:30 pm
Educating Differently:
The focus of our CoP will be anchoring conversation around practices that have proven effective and are currently undergoing important changes, as is our profession as a whole. How will we continue to effectively educate differently? This is for educators that have had classroom experience in these past 3 school years and are looking to meaningfully engage in collaboration to assimilate the prospect of what being an educator will be within the next few school years. What practices can we continue with, refine, or adopt?
Book: Onward by Elena Aguilar
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader Rosa Alvarez
Meeting Times: First Wednesday of the month, 4:00 – 5:30 pm
Let’s Take Care of Ourselves:
The focus of our COP will be self care, keeping teachers healthy, and dealing with stress. We all know that teaching is stressful, and getting more stressful all the time, and teachers can be challenged to do their own self care. Ideally, we will also be able to support each other and encourage each other to practice more self care. We will be looking at prevention versus palliative care through a public health lens. This CoP is for new educators, any teacher wanting to rejuvenate their love of teaching, and all educators who want to practice more self care.
Book: Onward by Ellen Aguilar
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader Michelle Parcés
Meeting Times: Second Thursday of the month, 5:00 – 6:30 pm
REAL Self-Care in Action!:
The focus is to provide opportunities for teachers to participate in real-self care activities and explore new ways to reset and rejuvenate. Self-Care has become a buzzword and advice on what educators should be doing to take care of themselves. This group will be exploring more individualized self-care strategies by experiencing different activities at various locations. Participants can incorporate this authentic self-care into their lives to help them reset, rejuvenate and revive themselves. Participants will have input regarding the activities the group will be engaged in. This CoP is for all exhausted and overwhelmed educators.
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader Patricia Moore
Meeting Times: Third Tuesday of the month (some flexibility in the schedule may occur due to the activities we may choose).
Play, Create, & Innovate:
The goal of this community is to (re)discover our own favorite forms of play and creation and use it as a creative muse to innovate our lessons and engage students. This CoP is for educators and administrators of all grade levels.
Book: Onward by Elena Aguilar (and Play by Stuart Brown)
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader Ashton Gildea
Meeting Times: Third Sunday of the month, 3:00-4:30pm in person @ UA Maker Space
Personalized Competency Based Learning
The focus of this CoP is to build a community of educators and other stakeholders who wish to learn about/engage with Personalized Competency Based Learning (PCBL), a set of student-centered strategies designed to ensure that equity for all learners is embedded in the culture, structure, and pedagogy of educational oraganizations. Students are encouraged to make informed decisions about the learning pathways that best demonstrate mastery, placing emphasis on voice and choice. Assessments are designed to be meaningful and empowering learning tools that provide timely, relevant, and actionable data. Students receive differentiated support based on their individual learning needs while meeting the common grade level expectations. The goal of this CoP is to bring awareness to all stakeholders regarding the diverse learning needs of students by utilizing ongoing classroom data to identify and analyze progress over time. This CoP is for classroom teachers, specialists, EL and special education teachers and program coordinators, site administrators, and instructional coaches. *All interested stakeholders are welcome.
Resources: Center for the Future of Arizona (Arizona Personalized Learning Center); Aurora Institute.
Led by: TREC Teacher Leader April Rubsach
Meeting Times: First Thursday of the month, 4:00-5:30 pm (subject to change if a more feasible time is requested)
The Many Languages of Literacy
The intention of this CoP is to create a context that encourages educators to explore the many languages for narration and representation. We will use Mosaic Marks Words Material book, share related articles, and host guest speakers to guide our sessions. We will have 6 sessions online and 4 sessions in person at the Keen Studio. Members will receive a Literacy Care Package including: A copy of Mosaic of Marks Words and Journaling materials
Led by: TREC Teacher Leaders Shyleigh Scott and Caroline Carson
Meeting Times: First Tuesday of the Month, 4:30-5:30
Mentoring CoP
The purpose of this CoP is to support current mentors or those who want to become mentors. This is for teachers with 5+ years of experience interested in mentoring and/or currently mentoring.
Book: Mentoring Each Other by Lana Parker and Diane Vetter
Led by: TREC Teacher Leaders Lauren, Karyn, Edna, and Sarah
Meeting Times: TBD
Equitable Grading CoP
This CoP will explore topics of equitable grading and what it can look like your classroom and/or school.
Book: Grading for Equity by John Feldman.
Meeting Times: Fourth Thursday of the Month, 4:30 – 5:45 (5:45 – 6:00 Q/A)
New Teachers on the Block (ATA only)
The focus of our COP will be to cultivate resilience with ATA teachers and support them through their first year of teaching. This CoP is for ATA (Arizona Teacher Academy) First Year Teachers
Book: Onward by Elena Aguilar
Led by: TREC Teacher Leaders Lori LaRussa and Danielle Swartz
Meeting Day/Time: TBD (monthly, possibly on Thursdays) 4:30-6:00pm
To Resiliency and Beyond (ATA only)
The focus of our COP will be to cultivate resilience with ATA teachers and support them through their first year of teaching. This CoP is for ATA (Arizona Teacher Academy) First Year Teachers
Book: Onward by Elena Aguilar
Led by: TREC Teacher Leaders Jessica Jankowski-Gallo and Danielle Swartz
Meeting Day/Time: TBD (monthly, possibly on Tuesdays) 4:30-6:00pm
Ready to sign up? CoP Sign up Here
- For questions regarding this resource, please contact .
- Contact Name: Alicia Durbin
- Email Address: adurbin@arizona.edu