THE PRACTICE: Professional development should be continuous and on-going, involving follow-up and support for further learning, including support from sources external to the school that can provide necessary resources and new perspectives.
Content Presented By:
National Partnership for Excellence & Accountability in Teaching
NEIRTEC, Northeast & Islands Regional Technology in Education Consortium

Resources related to this practice:

• PDS Partnership Development: A Listserv for PDS Educators
  

  The National Institute for Community Innovations and its partners have created an online forum focusing on issues related to developing professional development school partnerships and to strengthening existing partnerships. Topics for discussion, exploration, and exchange include: characteristics of successful partnerships; obstacles to collaboration and how to overcome them; stages of partnership development; expanding participation in partnership initiatives; structures and strategies used by successful partnerships; methods for evaluating the effectiveness of partnerships; renewing and revitalizing partnerships.

  To subscribe, send an e-mail message to majordomo@nici-mc2.org and leave the subject line blank. In the body of the message, type "subscribe pds-devel." Do not attach a signature file. Once you have been added to the list, send your messages with questions, comments, and information about helpful resources to pds-devel@nici-mc2.org

  Any questions about the forum should be directed to:
  Robert McLaughlin, Executive Director, NICI
  235 Main Street, Montpelier, VT 05602
  Telephone: 802-223-0463, Fax: 802-229-2013
  mclaughlinb@nici-mc2.org

• Peer-Assisted Leadership (PAL) Program
  http://www.ed.gov/pubs/triedandtrue/peer.html

  Non-judgmental, inquiry-based approach to leadership development in which principals form partnerships to help each other reflect on their practice. PAL partners work together over a period of 4 to 8 months, shadowing and interviewing each other to collect data and analyze their leadership activities in context. Participants also meet regularly as a group, learning and practicing various inquiry skills (e.g., shadowing, interviewing, theme identification), as well as sharing and processing their partnership experiences. These meetings, together with the partnerships, provide a supportive forum for professional dialog that reduces isolation, deepens understanding, and supports change.

• Questioning and Understanding to Improve Learning and Thinking (QUILT)
  http://www.ed.gov/pubs/triedandtrue/quest.html

  Staff development program designed to increase students' true thinking time by helping teachers improve their classroom questioning techniques. Three major components are provided in the program: (1) Induction training: Teachers learn about effective questioning techniques during a 3-day (18-hour) introductory training period conducted by members of a local facilitation team; (2) Collegiums: Participants meet in seven 90-minute seminars throughout the school year to learn, share, and interact about particular questioning behaviors targeted for practice and improvement; and (3) Partnering: Teachers observe and are observed by partners six times during the year.

• Strategic Teaching and Reading Project (STRP)
  http://www.ed.gov/pubs/triedandtrue/strat.html

  Focus on professional development based on the premise that teachers must receive training and support in strategic teaching in order to help students become strategic readers and learners themselves. STRP, developed by the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL), emphasizes the team approach, which spreads the demands of instructional leadership among team members, builds on areas of expertise, fosters collaboration, and reduces threats to the continuity of the project that can come from staff turnover.

• What Works in the Middle: Results-based Staff Development
  http://www.nsdc.org/midbook/

  This is a consumer's guide, based on a two-year study by the National Staff Development Council, to 26 staff development programs that boost student learning in the middle grades in the core content areas of language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies by increasing teachers' knowledge and skills. The guide includes a description of the staff development programs, guidelines for selecting and/or designing initiatives to improve student achievement, strategies for evaluating staff development, and more information about how these programs were selected.

General resources related to this spotlight:

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This resource is developed and maintained by The Education Alliance at Brown University. Seed funding was provided by the U.S. Department of Education. Send comments to: loom@alliance.brown.edu