Communities of Practice & Building Capacity

Two common terms used in education today are Communities of Practice and Building Capacity. They seem to intertwine within each other.

Etienne Wenger states that: "Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly ...In pursuing their interest in their domain, members engage in joint activities and discussions, help each other, and share information. They build relationships that enable them to learn from each other."

The Urban Institute talks about Building Capacity in Non Profit Organizations: "By examining capacity building from a new perspective and agreeing to work collaboratively, each group can reinforce the other's efforts. In the end, they will know more about what works, what does not work, and why."

By building capacity we build the capacity of our organization, our learning community, our community of practice (CoP). In other words, the CoP will benefit as well as the organization, the learning institution as a whole, impacting and strengthening the infrastructure of the social network that makes up the community, thereby improving the community.

Yes, Communities of Practice and Building Capacity do intertwine...and two important issues to work on to improve our schools and learning institutions.