The Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning
The Bok Center offers faculty, graduate students, and other instructors a wide variety of resources and programming to foster excellence in teaching and learning. We strive to promote a culture of experimentation, collaboration, and reflection about teaching, and to support instructors in creating equitable and inclusive learning environments. The Center supports faculty in designing their courses and syllabi, in developing their classroom presence, and in exploring evidence-based strategies to promote learning. Annual series of lunches, mentoring workshops, exploratory seminars, and reading groups and journal clubs draw faculty together into communities of practice. We collaborate with the Office for Faculty Affairs to facilitate a peer observation program for tenure-track faculty in the FAS. Additionally, our Learning Lab collaborates with faculty to create and implement innovative assignments and course activites.
The Bok Center offers a robust slate of professional development programming for PhD students. Early-stage PhD students look to the Bok Center as they prepare to teach, and may attend our Fall Teaching Conference or Winter Teaching Week for an introduction to the foundations of teaching, or take a Bok Seminar to explore topics in teaching, learning, and communication. We serve international students and scholars who want to improve their oral English communication skills to prepare for the language and culture of the Harvard classroom through our Professional Communication Program for International Teachers and Scholars. Advanced PhD students can demonstrate their commitment to developing as teachers in higher education by pursuing one of our Teaching Certificates or by applying to our Pedagogy Fellows and Media and Design Fellows programs, where we partner with departments to enhance training and support for graduate student teachers across the FAS.
Further information and resources on teaching are available on the Bok Center’s website.
Wheelchair accessible.