A community of practice is a group of “people informally bound together by shared expertise and passion for joint enterprise” (Wenger 2000, p.139). They differ from other organisational functional units or teams as it is the shared meaning and interests of its members that keep it together rather than merely set tasks (Wenger 1998a). Communities of practice can emerge around new events, changes or organisational shifts, such as the implementation of new teaching methods, but institutional change can also create situations in which communities lose their relevance, rendering their practice extraneous and leading to disestablishment. This paper presents the results of a research project investigating a curriculum development team of an allied health school at an Australian university. The team emerged as a community of practice through the instigation of new teaching methods and subsequently came to an end in response to directives to change their teaching practice. The data were collected through informal, semi-structured interviews that provide insights into the ways in which the members constructed their practices within the community and the ways this was integral to their workplace identities. The paper describes the collaborative, collegial environment in which the community of practice emerged. It reports on the ways in which the membership of this community provided members with a recognised and rewarded organisational identity. The authors contrast the members’ responses to a subsequent organisational shift in teaching practices and the resultant devaluing and disestablishment of the community. The authors conclude that the ways in which change is implemented in tertiary institutions influence the ways in which academic staff engage with their work.

Keywords: communities of practice, universities, academic work