- Choosing a Teams template

OVERVIEW

Target audience: Students, faculty, and staff members

When you create a new team in Microsoft Teams, you will be asked to select from one of four templates:

Class
Professional Learning Community (PLC)
Staff
Other

This article describes the differences between each template and which to use depending on your goals.

CAUTION: PUBLIC VS. PRIVATE TEAMS

When creating a new Team, you can generally select between a Private and a Public team. (Class teams are always Private.) If you make a Public team:
- Any McGill user can find your team/group and join
- Even without joining, any McGill user can find, access, and likely edit any document anywhere on your site, including files posted in your Teams channels.
- Email attachments sent through your group email will be visible and saved to your site

Teams Templates

Use this table to decide which team template meets your teaching and learning goals.

	Class	Professional Learning Community (PLC)	Staff	Other
Members	Teachers and students collaborating on group projects, assignments, and more. Examples of use: delivering live lectures, facilitating synchronous learning/discussion.	Educators collaborating within a professional learning community.  Examples of use: academic department, grade band, group working on a shared goal.	Staff leaders and staff members collaborating on University administration and development.	Students and staff collaborating. Examples: interest groups, clubs.
Privacy	Private*	Public or Private*	Public or Private*	Public or Private*
Team owner(s)	Teachers	Educators	Staff leaders	Any combination of students and staff
Team members (added by the owners)	Students	Other educators	Staff members	Students and staff
Permissions	Teachers moderate student conversations and who can post where. Students only have write permission in certain areas.	Educators share equal read-write permissions.	Staff leaders control posting settings. Staff members only have write permission in certain areas.	Team members share equal read-write permissions unless the team owner(s) alter the settings.
Features	Class Notebook Assignments Conversations Files Video and audio calls Chat (if enabled) Pinning new tabs with documents or sites like Microsoft Forms	OneNote notebook Conversations Files Meetings Video and audio calls Chat (if enabled) Pinning new tabs with documents or sites like Microsoft Forms	Staff notebook Conversations Files Meetings Video and audio calls Chat (if enabled) Pinning new tabs with documents or sites like Microsoft Forms	OneNote notebook Conversations Files Meetings Video and audio calls Chat (if enabled) Pinning new tabs with documents or sites like Microsoft Forms
Educational goals	Assign, track, and review student work Export grades Collaborate and communicate in the classroom Make announcements Administer quizzes and polls Work in student groups Share and organize rich content Invite virtual experts into the classroom	Collaborate and communicate in professional learning communities Make announcements Share work Organize virtual or face-to-face meetings Work in smaller groups Share and organize content	Oversee professional development, staff, and administrative goals Communicate Make announcements Share content and progress reports Work in smaller groups Organize virtual or face-to-face meetings	Collaborate and communicate with team members Make announcements Share content Organize virtual or face-to-face meetings Work in smaller groups
Additional Resources	Create a class team in Microsoft Teams Add a student to a class team Remove students from a class team Create an assignment in Microsoft Teams	Create a PLC team in Microsoft Teams	Create a staff team in Microsoft Teams

* For a Private team, only team owners can add members. A Private team is not visible to others in your organization

ADDITIONAL REFERENCES:

This article is adapted from Microsoft's Choose a team type to collaborate in Microsoft Teams

Other Teams articles in the IT Knowledge Base: