Lifelong Learning

Professional development issues and opportunities

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Teachers find themselves today in an environment of increasing social and technological complexity, ever more rigorous academic standards and goals, and stricter accountability for classroom outcomesan environment in which professional development is more critical than ever. As challenges multiply, and as the expectations facing the overall educational establishment rise with them, new approaches are sought to the ongoing issue of how teachers continue to grow and learn. One source of intensified pressure on educators is the federal government. The education portion of the Obama administrations American Recovery and Reinvestment Act declares its commitment to supporting teachers. Indeed, federal funding of teacher-training programs will reach $235 million in 2011, doubling the 2010 figure. At the same time, the administration warns of its intention to hold teachers more accountable, using rewards and incentives to retain strong teachers while challenging states and school districts to remove ineffective ones from the classroom. An understanding of the primary issues in todays discussion about professional development, and ideas for what works, can help create a climate of achievement at any grade level.

The preparation of teachers today is the Dodge City of the educational world

Continuity and coherence over ad hoc approaches According to some experts, its clear that a more comprehensive approach to teacher professional development is called for, one that substitutes continuity and coherence for the more typical staff-development day approach of occasional in-school workshops and seminars. Such an approach has been routinely lamented in the professional literature, notes an Education Week overview of the issue. It not only lacks continuity and coherence but misconceivesthe way adults learn best, andfails to appreciate the complexity of teachers work.1 Small wonder, then, that only 18 percent of teachers polled in a survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Education described the professional development they received as connected to a great extent to other school-improvement activities, and only 10 to 15 percent reported receiving significant follow-up materials or activities for the training they did undergo.2 The alternative approach advocated by most of the professional literature for at least 20 years holds that, for teacher learning to truly matter, it needs to take place in a more active and coherent intellectual environmentone in which ideas can be exchanged and an explicit connection to the bigger picture of school improvement is made. Columbia Teachers College president emeritus Arthur Levinewho spearheaded the Education Schools Project 2006 study, Educating School Teacherstraces the challenge of quality post-graduate development back to the training that aspiring

teachers receive at the university level. The study concluded that university-level teacher training leaves a great deal to be desired. More than three out of five of the alumni (62 percent) felt their programs did not prepare graduates to cope with todays classroom realities, Levine wrote in an article summarizing the purpose, methodology and findings of the study. Principals also were critical: Only 40 percent thought education schools were preparing new teachers very well or moderately well.3 After a thorough evaluation of the more than 1,200 university-based teacher education programsthe most extensive study of its kind ever conducted Levine offered some sobering observations: Most teachers are trained in programs characterized by low admission and graduation standards Many programs operate in isolation from real-world classrooms and teachers State and accreditation standards for upholding quality are ineffective [T]he preparation of teachers today is the Dodge City of the educational world, Levine observes. Like the fabled Wild West town, the field is unruly and chaotic and the chaos is increasing. Reaching consensus about the right kind of training The situation could hardly be otherwise, Levine argues, when there is no consensus on what constitutes proper teacher training, or even whether teaching is a true profession like law and medicine, requiring extensive pre-practice training, or a craft (like journalism) which is largely learned on the job. On this issue turn

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Some experts minimize the importance of such training, arguing that strong teachers are born, not made.

questions of what kind of training teachers should receive before entering the classroom, and who should provide it. This lack of consensus has opened the door to wide variability in pathways into teaching and entry requirements for teaching, as well as a diminished role for university-based teacher education programs, Levine writes. Levines perspective on pre-professional training and education shines a light on why effective or consistent programs or approaches to professional development often dont emerge. Another reason behind the challenge of creating consistently effective development programs may be that there is minimal consensus about the value of professional teacher development. Some experts minimize the importance of such training, arguing that strong teachers are born, not made. From this point of view, the way to improve classroom outcomes is to recruit and retain talented teachers while continuously weeding out those who are unable to deliver the required outcomes. Deselection is the euphemism favored in Creating a New Teaching Profession, a recently published volume of academic papers arguing that the answer to Americas education woes lies in hiring and retaining strong teachers and unsentimentally firing the weak ones.4 Is professional development beside the point? Elizabeth Green, a Spencer fellow in education reporting at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and editor of GothamSchools.org, penned a widely discussed March 2010 New York Times article

that cites a number of prominent adherents of the view that improving school performance is more an issue of personnel management than developing programs for professional development.5 Green notes that data generated by the testing mandates of the Bush administrations No Child Left Behind initiative have persuaded some education researchers that the teacher assigned to a given classroom is the only factor under school control that has a significant impact on student outcomes. Teachers working in the same building, teaching the same grade, produced very different outcomes, Green wrote. And the gaps were huge. Thus merit paya system of providing cash bonuses to the best teachershas emerged as a touchstone in education-reform discussions, according to Green. The Obama administrations education department has endorsed the merit pay concept by increasing the federal Teacher Incentive Fund from $97 million to $400 million this year and by establishing the Race to the Top program, a $4.3 billion fund earmarked for states whose laws allow school administrators to evaluate teachers based on student performance. But merit pay has its skepticsamong them Harvard economics professor Edward L. Glaeser, who is concerned that a federally mandated, top-down merit-pay system is too easily compromised at the local level. It challenges the compensation status quo, which rewards thingslike graduate degreesthat are statistically unrelated to student outcomes. But school districts can water down academic goals and award bonuses to teachers who clear low hurdlesor even just spend the money on regular teacher salaries. If the people on the ground dont want an incentive system, Glaeser wrote recently in the New York Times, they will have little desire to provide the necessary

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The performance of naturally gifted, instinctive teachers can be studied and broken down into discrete, teachable techniques, for teachers who lack some of these innate abilities.
safeguards to prevent cheating that overturns that system.6 A new approach in Chicago improve evaluation first At the Chicago Public Schoolswhere 93 percent of teachers receive excellent or superior ratings despite the fact that half of the systems schools are on probationefforts are under way to reformulate teacher performance evaluations in response to more stringent expectations emanating from Washington, D.C. The Chicago school system is attempting to redesign its teacher evaluation methods under a pilot program called Excellence in Teaching, which is now being tested in 100 Chicago schools.7 The program intends to replace the relatively superficial checklist that has long been in use for teacher evaluations with a procedure that not only defines good and bad teaching with greater precision than ever before, but also provides a common terminology that will enable meaningful performance-related discussions between principals and teachers and insists on evidence that teachers are satisfying required standards. The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) supports the program in concept, though the specific details of a new evaluation system are subject to negotiation. Connee R. Fitch-Blanks, who coordinates professional development programs for the CTU, told the New York Times: Our current process is a flawed process. It does not lend itself to teacher growth or student achievement. Starting the performance and development discussion based on more precise evaluations may lead to more meaningful development plans, or give current programs greater impact. Good teaching: learned technique or voodoo? Viewing the challenge as a personnel or performance issue rather than one of effective professional development plays into the view of good teachers as embodiments of a born natural ability rather than conscientiously developed technique, honed from well-designed development programs. But is good teaching always innate rather than learned? Are the most talented teachers simply exercising an incommunicable voodoo, as one education expert puts it? If not, then a focus on more aggressively recruiting and lavishly rewarding good teachers with the corollary imperative of swiftly identifying and removing the weaker oneswont do the job all by itself. Development must play a role. Doug Lemov, a former teacher and school administrator who now works as an education consultant, told Green that its a mistake to focus exclusively on teacher hiring and firing. To those who contend that some teachers harbor an innate talent for their callingand that others just dontLemov counters that effective teaching is often the exercise of consciously developed and refined technique that only appears to be natural, untutored ability. Thus the more promising way forward, as Green paraphrases Lemovs view, would stress the need to improve the quality of the teachers who are already teaching. And that brings the discussion back to teacher professional development. Lemovs extensive research into the subject leads him to reject the view that natural talent alone separates effective from ineffective teachers. He holds that the performance of naturally

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gifted, instinctive teachers can be studied and broken down into discrete, teachable techniques, for teachers who lack some of these innate abilities. Learning from the best teachers To that end, Lemov spent five years making a careful study of the best teachers he could find all across the country and compiled his findings in a book published last April titled Teach Like a Champion: The 49 Techniques That Put Students on a Path to College. Known informally as Lemovs Taxonomy, the books advice to teachers includes several concrete techniques aimed simply at getting students to pay attention in the classroom a skill as specialized, intricate and learnable as playing guitar, as Green puts it. One teacher in Boston, for example, advised Lemov to simply stand still when giving instructions to studentsleave the multi-tasking for another time. He took the suggestion and found that he no longer had to ask his students to take out their homework several times before they complied. Once was suddenly enough. Its a seemingly small adjustment in teacher behavior, but one that paid a significant and immediate dividend in student engagement.

And the fact that Teacher A does this naturally, without the aid of training, does not preclude Teacher B from learning the technique in a professional-development context and incorporating it into his or her teaching method. Other educators, meanwhile, report success or at least encouraging signs with other approaches to teacher professional development, some incorporating social media and other new technologies. As already noted, one of the drawbacks of one-off, in-school workshops can be the inability for participants to follow up with each other, continue to exchange ideas and connect their learning to larger educational contexts. New technologies can provide opportunities and a framework for overcoming these pitfalls. The unique advantages of online training Chris Dede, professor of learning technologies at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, is the editor of Online Professional Development for Teachers: Emerging Models and Methods, published in 2006. The book compiles the perspectives of a group of experts brought together by Dede for a professionaldevelopment conference at Harvard in 2005.

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In a 2009 interview with Teacher Magazine,8 Dede remarks that online professional development can be an attractive option for teachers who struggle to find time to attend face-to-face courses. And beyond the convenience factor, Dede argues that the online mode of instruction often has distinct advantages over in-person sessions. Enabling reflection and meaningful sharing online I think one of the strengths of online [professional development] is that it gives the opportunity for reflection, Dede says. [Y]ou may want the chance to think carefully about something thats new to you, thats transformative, before you really start developing a reaction to it. But online teacher professional development that includes an asynchronous component helps with that kind of reflection. Dede adds that online training affords participants a measure of distance that may help them

overcome their reluctance to share certain thoughts or experiences they would consider risky in an in-person setting with a whole bunch of faces staring at you. And as he looks ahead and considers the impact of the recent economic downturn on education, Dede sees the role of online professional development only increasing. In light of many economists assessments that it will take quite a while for the national economy to recover the strength it knew prior to the downturn of the last couple of years, schools will seek out a less labor-intensive educational model. And to get to that model, he predicts, online professional development is going to be important, in part because it is scalable, but also because its obviously technology-based. So whatever else youre teaching, youre also giving teachers, as a kind of frosting, the experience of working with powerful

In Massachusetts, induction programs ease the transition for new administrators

The issues surrounding teacher professional development shouldnt distract from the professional development needs of school administrators and other educators working outside the classroom. For example, special challenges face administrators, especially new school principals, as they step into a brand-new environment as leaders. Induction programs can help new administrators get their legs under them more quickly. The Massachusetts Department of Education developed a set of guidelines for model induction programs.9 The departments report states that new-principal induction programs should address, among other things, the following: Creating and sustaining a collaborative school culture focused on high achievement Providing instructional leadership to teachers Developing procedures for collecting and analyzing student data that can inform decisions on curriculum and student performance Collaborating with teachers, students, parents and other community members on issues affecting the school Budget planning and management Conflict-resolution and problem-solving strategies The departments administrator induction programs are intended to be supportive not instructive in nature and are designed to address the needs of and provide meaningful on-going support for administrators who are new to a specific position or district.

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learning technologies, and that can help prepare them to use these tools in the classroom. The range of viewpoints on teacher professional development, and the varied approaches to the issue that it engenders, ensures that professional development will remain a hot-button issue in the educational world. This is especially so in light of new requirements and priorities prescribed by the Obama administrations education initiatives.

These requirements are in addition to the ongoing technological, social and cultural changes that teachers continuously must adapt to. How best to enable teachers to meet those challenges? An understanding of the tough questions and issues, as well as the many success stories and winning strategies, may be the best way to effectively involve professional development in creating a climate of achievement.

Making Professional Development Work

Professional Development: Learning From the Best, a toolkit developed by the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL),10 identifies approaches to teacher professional development adopted by winners of the U.S. Department of Educations National Awards Program for Model Professional Development. The NCRELs analysis of the award winners yields the following advice for designing successful programs: Ensure that key stakeholders have a voice from the start. Communicate and share plans and outcomes Embed professional development goals in district and school goals Create a needs assessment that links student needs with teacher learning gaps Research and build on the innovations of successful schools Set priorities to focus resources (time, money, facilities) for maximum impact Set general goals and aim for objectives rooted in detailed, nitty gritty needs Think beyond workshops to activities that directly and immediately can be applied to the classroom and integrated into ongoing school planning Evaluate and measure plans, data and student and teacher outcomes

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Citations
1. Professional Development. Education Week. Web. http://www.edweek.org/ew/issues/professional-development/ 2. Parsad, Basmat, Lewis, Laurie and Ferris, Elizabeth. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. Teacher Preparation and Professional Development: 2000, NCES 2001088. Washington, DC: 2001. 3. Arthur Levine, Taming the Wild West of Teacher Education: Radical Solutions to the Problem of Teaching Teachers. Scholastic. Web. http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=7550&print=1 4. Goldhaber, Dan and Hannaway, Jane. Creating a New Teaching Profession. Washington, DC: Urban Institute Press. 2009. Print. 5. Green, Elizabeth. Building a Better Teacher, The New York Times 2 March 2010. 6. Glaeser, Edward L. The Uncertain Impact of Merit Pay for Teachers, The New York Times 8 June 2010. 7. Cyednak, Crystal. Schools Test a New Tool for Improving Evaluation of Teachers, The New York Times 8 April 2010. 8. Rebora, Anthony. The Changing Landscape of Teacher Learning, Education Week. 1 October 2009. Web. http://www.edweek.org/tsb/articles/2009/10/01/01dede.h03.html?print=1 9. Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Web. www.doe.mass.edu/education/mentor. 10. Hassel, Emily. Professional Development: Learning From the Best. Oakbrook: North Central Regional Education Laboratory. 1999. Web. 20 July 2010

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