Teachers Who Learn, Kids Who Achieve: A Look at Schools with Model Professional Development

Author: Western Regional Educational Laboratory
Publisher: WestEd
Publication Date: 2000
Publication City: San Francisco
Publication State: CA
Full text available online at: http://www.wested.org/cs/we/view/rs/179

Abstract (written by WestEd)

What does it take to translate teacher professional development into impressive learning gains for students?

This research study of eight schools that won the U.S. Department of Education's National Award for Model Professional Development distills the elements of these schools' pervasive cultures of learning — for teachers, students, the entire community. It identifies the following guiding principles:

• student-centered goals
  
• an expanded definition of professional development
  
• ongoing, job-embedded informal learning
  
• a collaborative environment
  
• time for learning and collaboration
  
• checking for results

Annotated lists of resources provide concrete help for school site and district leaders to put these principles into practice.

Nikola Filby, Co-Director of WREL at WestEd, said, "The lessons we learned can be applied in any school, but the vision and discipline to stick with them require school staffs like those we met, educators whose goals never waver from what their students need. The people in these schools didn't succeed because they're superstars or over-achievers. They're good, to be sure, and they worked hard, but they succeeded because they had concrete plans that let them turn their caring for their kids into learning and achievement, for themselves as well as their students."