Today, #Edchat’s first Topic was: Which should we support first for the best result, a reform in student learning (teaching methods), or a reform in teacher learning (PD)? I did have a preference when I made up the question, but I saved my opinion for the chat. There were a few comments about this being a question similar to: which came first, the chicken or the egg? I didn’t see it that way. I was simply looking for the most immediate way to affect needed change in a system that by many accounts is failing to meet goals, as its shortcomings are exacerbated by deepening dependence on data driven decisions based on high stakes testing results.
I have a unique position as an adjunct in the Department of Education in a small private college. I am a supervisor of student teachers in secondary English. My position enables me to visit and observe students totaling 40 to 50 visits a year in middle schools and high schools on Long Island, in New York. In addition to doing observations I often engage with cooperating teachers in discussions about their teaching experiences in their schools. I have observed over a long period of time that each school has its own culture. Some are teacher centered, and some are student centered. Some are tech infused, and some are tech deprived. Some districts are affluent and some have large pockets of poverty within the district. The differences not only vary from district to district, but also from building to building within a district.
It is the combination of the culture of the school combined with the leadership that determines the direction that any new teacher will take. They begin the job with the methods that they have learned, but the application of those methods, and their practice, more often than not, will be influenced, if not determined by the culture and leadership of the schools in which these young teachers have managed to secure jobs. The career span of an educator goes from 35 to 40 years in the system. The big question is: How do teachers stay relevant in their profession over that span of years? If our society was based on stagnant information that had little change over the years, teaching would be an easy profession. However, over a three, or four decades of teacher’s career in the Twenty-First Century there are huge changes. Changes in methods, technology tools, and even content. How do teachers stay relevant in this ever-changing world.
Many schools are set up with mentoring programs. Even without official programs the older teachers often take the fledglings under their wing to teach them the way of the school. This all works well as long as there is a healthy culture and a vibrant leadership. If however, there is an unhealthy culture, teachers who are burned out, resistant to change, unwilling to experiment and just putting in the time, that tends to perpetuate itself.
Professional Development is not usually done on school time. The school week is for instruction. There may be workshops offered on a voluntary basis after school hours. Usually there will be some type of Conference day during the year where development is scheduled. Occasionally, a consultant may be provided by the district for a training session on a pet project that an administrator saw at a conference. If there is a technology or IT staff, they may provide occasional workshops, but that is often a bells and whistles presentation of applications. For the most part PD decisions are left up to individual teachers to secure for themselves. This can be done by approved courses or workshops provided by colleges or professional organizations. Again we are talking about decades of professional development along these lines. This is not true for every school in every district, but I believe it happens in some degree more often than not.
The idea of educators needing to volunteer time and in many cases money to obtain professional development is also a losing battle. As new teachers mature and begin having families, both their time, and money become scarce commodities. There is less available time after school hours. Money is needed for the family before Professional Development. Once an educator falls behind in developments in the profession it is difficult to know what it is he or she does not know. Many view this as a generational gap. I see it as a learning gap, having little to do with age. After not learning new methods, or technology tools of learning for a long period of time, and considering the rate of change with technology, how can educators make informed decisions on what PD they need? This again continues the cycle of poor PD and a resulting lack of reform.
How do we break the cycle? How do we address the needed Professional Development in an ever-changing culture over four decades for each individual educator. The present system does not appear to be meeting the need. There are no simple solutions. What is obvious to me as a connected educator would be to get everyone connected using the internet. Of course for all of the reasons elaborated here most educators are not ready for that solution. Stagnant Professional Development promotes stagnant professionals!
We need to take a fresh approach to Professional Development. We can’t hold people responsible for what they do not know. PD must be included in the work week. We must provide the time and support it with meaningful development. I do believe in giving people choices, but I struggle with the idea that some educators may choose to stay in their comfort zones when we need them to leave those zones behind. The PD must be tailored to specific courses and in some cases to specific teachers or administrators. Education must be addressed and discussed as a profession. Trends should be examined. Experimentation needs to be encouraged. Administrators must lead the PD and not just mandate it. By continuing to educate our educators professionally, we should be able to expect a resulting reform. I don’t see this as a chicken or the egg thing. To be better educators, we need to be better learners.
My Island View 
Excellent points! I would add one more – if teachers see how PD does help them in their daily practices, they would also be more motivated to attend PD sessions. Often there is no link between PD and teachers’ realities. And of course, often the real PD determiners are time and costs – both which institutions should bear in mind and help support their staff’s professional motivation and development.
I agree with you on many levels. Often we make an assumption that teachers simply do not want to change. While that might be true of some, there are likely other factors at work, including time and money. Professional development takes one, the other or both of those. Even free PD like Twitter networks come with the cost of time. The motivation needs to be great for teachers to commit precious time needed to really keep up with the times. For schools to provide more time even for free PD, there is a cost. With time so scarce, teachers tend to want to be efficient with their PD, and hesitate to commit time to something they cannot immediately use. Then implementing new ideas takes a commitment of more time to rethink and rework lesson plans. I have been thinking about this a lot, too. Thanks for the post/
It is amazing the passion that surfaces in individuals as they start to discover all that awaits them in the PD realm regardless of the line of work. Personally, I found other experts to discuss issues with, cut hours off my work week by using technology more effectively, read books that changed my outlook and felt better connected to my goals. It may not be as complicated as it seems if we can harness that excitement when the discovery starts.
This is a great essay! I’m glad to see that you were inspired to write something from that #edchat — it seemed like you had a lot of great thoughts on the subject. You made it onto my list of favorite tweets so many times I had to cut some of your comments for the sake of brevity.
I’ll be sure to post a comment linking back to this post when my summary/analysis post of the conversation goes up on our blog tomorrow.
Some excellent points! Also the cost for schools to send staff on PD is huge – especially for conferences out of town. I think that there are several excellent and simple ways to combat both problems – staff meetings start with a ‘smack down’ (using a googledoc) to utilise the first 10 minutes of meetings for sharing what tools/sites/skills people are using. At syndicate meetings, we always start with a shared time which acknowledges everyone’s ability to try something new and then develops a culture of sharing. Every school has resident experts in some area so having ‘techie brekkies’ means that new knowledge can be shared then also. We have cluster PD too – organised by us as teachers AT NO COST – when we get together for a day/afternoon to share new learning and new ideas. They are EduCamps and we just go for as little or as much as we can of the day or session. Teachers are becoming increasingly more responsible for initiating their own PD and gathering people around them in their own and other schools who can drive their learning. I think we need to drive the changes in our schools if we can and then seek further afield when we need more.
Perhaps my opinion then on the egg/chicken is this…what about the hen? We need to shift the minds of the administrators and curriculum developers too – perhaps when they are on board and have reformed their thinking, the rest will be a natural flow on? Hmmmm.
I’ve seen school culture improve dramatically with PD included in the working week. The weekly staff meeting became a planned PD session. “Briefings” were done by email. Only issues that needed staff consensus were discussed in a meeting
As the staff became more skilled, the PD became less admin-driven and began to focus on individual staff needs. All PD was about what teachers could use in their classrooms to enhance student learning.
To make it work, PD sessions were interactive, not “death by Powerpoint”.
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