What a System-Wide Faculty Learning Community On Generative AI Looks Like in Action

When the University of North Carolina (UNC) System introduced its faculty learning community (FLC) on the use of AI in instruction in 2023, the 64 participants it attracted tended to be faculty and administrators who were new to AI, curious about its impact, and a bit cautious.

Now, in its third year, the UNC System Generative AI in Teaching and Learning FLC has nearly quadrupled in size, and members—mainly faculty and staff—are much more interested in exploring and innovating with AI, says Heather McCullough, the state system’s senior director of academic programs. Instead, they are embracing it as a way to enhance learning.

“Three years ago, many were really eager to learn about policy,” she says. “Membership now has veered toward cross-disciplinary groups that learn from each other to determine learning goals and develop a learning plan for themselves.”

As of February 2026, the 2025–2026 UNC System FLC had 230 members from across the 16 colleges and universities in the UNC System. The participants included administrators, faculty, librarians, and instructional professionals representing each of the system’s institutions. Together, their institutions serve about 250,000 students per year.

From pockets of interest to a community

A faculty learning community brings together professionals with a common interest or question to engage in discussion, learn collaboratively, and build community on that topic. For the UNC System, the Gen AI FLC addresses a need that McCullough identified in 2023 as the system’s leaders began fielding questions about the use of AI.

“We had pockets of interest bubbling up at different institutions,” she says. “There were really a lot of questions around, ‘What does this mean? What is this new technology? What does it mean for the work that we do?’”

McCullough’s professional experience includes work with a center for teaching and learning, where she discovered how powerful FLCs can be for exploring concepts and developing resources as a group. An FLC about AI, a topic that had captured the interest of many throughout the UNC System, seemed a perfect fit.

This year’s community, guided by three facilitators, focuses on the use of generative AI in teaching and learning through activities and materials including meetings, webinars with partner organizations, a newsletter, and a growing infrastructure that the participants have initiated themselves.

Learning from each other

This year’s UNC System Gen AI FLC structure features collaboration circles based on topics that community members selected related to AI in teaching and learning. Each member participating in a collaboration circle partners with four to seven colleagues to study:

• Use of AI in exams, papers, and grading
• Impact of AI on the value of higher education credentials
• Effect of AI detection and monitoring on academic trust
• Role of educators as the use of AI expands
• Use of AI as a collaborator in teaching, learning, and research

“This is a faculty development program defined by and driven by their interests,” McCullough says. “And they’re doing this of their own volition. I think they’re naturally interested in learning from each other.”

It is common for participants to discuss how they are augmenting their own instruction using AI. For example, an instructor of a contemporary art class using AI to study images so students could identify bias in AI product’s responses and practice adjusting how they prompt it.

McCullough describes a wide variety of activity and output stemming from the FLCs and individual collaboration circles:

• Some are writing white papers about their area of focus for the UNC System Learning and Technology Journal.
• A virtual poster session on the use of AI in different disciplines drew dozens of FLC participants, and their questions and discussion extended past the end of the event.
• Some members initiated a book club on AI in teaching and learning.

An opportunity to explore

Asked for advice to peer institutions about starting a similar FLC, McCullough says, of course, AI can help with that work. She shared a document developed by the FLC facilitators that readers can use to prompt a generative AI tool to develop an outline for a faculty learning community.

Beyond that, she says, the UNC System has learned a few lessons about leading a successful FLC, including:

• Choose facilitators who are experienced at leading community conversations.
• Pay attention to the interests and needs of participants.
• Be clear that the group is an opportunity to explore the use of AI in teaching and learning, not just an AI tutorial.

“This has been a phenomenal way to develop a systemwide common language around AI and teaching and learning,” says McCullough. “They’re learning from each other in real time and sharing best practices. It has helped them feel less isolated and alone in a very fast-moving time.”