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Effective professional development can advance achievement of all students in a school, according to recent research by Fred Newmann and colleagues at UW-Madison. They found that improving student achievement is more likely to happen when professional development addresses not only the learning of individual teachers, but also other dimensions of the school’s organizational capacity.

To learn how some schools used professional development to address school capacity, Newmann, Bruce King, and Peter Youngs studied nine urban elementary schools. These schools were selected through a national search for schools that served large proportions of low-income students and that (a) had histories of low achievement, (b) had shown progress in student achievement over the previous 3 to 5 years, (c) attributed their progress to schoolwide and sustained professional development, (d) participated in site-based management, and (e) had received significant professional development assistance from one or more external agencies.

Varying approaches

All of the schools appeared to have high potential for addressing all aspects of capacity. But after 2 years of data collection, it became clear that the schools varied considerably both in their approaches to professional development and in the extent to which they addressed aspects of capacity.

Two schools used professional development to comprehensively address school capacity. These schools illustrate contrasting approaches to professional development and the roles of external agencies. Lewis Elementary, in an urban district in Texas, focused on schoolwide implementation of Success for All, a comprehensive program developed by a national organization that provided ongoing technical assistance. At Renfrew Elementary, in an urban district in California, teachers crafted an approach to improving instruction and achievement unique to their school by developing learning standards at each grade level, measuring student performance with special attention to achievement gaps between students of different racial and ethnic backgrounds, and discussing implications of the results for curriculum and teaching. Schools that used professional development less comprehensively were more likely to use traditional short-term approaches such as one-time workshops or college courses chosen at teachers’ discretion without collaboration and systematic infusion into the school program.

Lewis and Renfrew schools demonstrated that it is possible for urban elementary schools serving low-income students to organize professional development to comprehensively address school capacity and that this can be accomplished through diverse approaches. Newmann and colleagues also found that comprehensive use of professional development over time was strongly related to schools’ initial capacity and to principal leadership that channeled professional development; and positively related to funding; but not consistently related to the level of external technical assistance or extent of policy support from district and state.

The researchers synthesized literature from different perspectives to elaborate a conception of school capacity and its findings on how schools use professional development to address different aspects of capacity. Their synthesis presents a perspective on school reform that could benefit schools, districts, states, and other providers of professional development.

Newmann says the failure to craft professional development to address school capacity comprehensively may well be a major reason for the disappointing results of so many school improvement initiatives. If so, it seems that those who fund, regulate, and design programs and policies that affect professional development should try to advance all dimensions of school capacity and to minimize ways in which professional development and other policies undermine dimensions of capacity.

In a related study, researcher Peter Youngs examined the ways school district policy can enhance or undermine professional development.

Coherency and consistency important

Youngs examined connections between district policy related to professional development and school capacity in one school in each of four school districts. For two of the schools, Kintyre and Renfrew Elementary Schools, Youngs found that district policy for professional development addressed shared commitment, collaboration, and reflective inquiry. For example, Kintyre’s district required consolidated plans in which schools focused improvement efforts in one content area over several years and provided assistance through district resource teachers. Kintyre elected to focus on reading and built a strong, shared commitment to particular strategies for teaching reading. The district resource teacher who worked with the school helped plan and carry out schoolwide professional development related to guided reading and other instructional strategies. In addition, several district-sponsored activities, including a weeklong summer literacy institute, enhanced teacher collaboration. In contrast, teachers from Pitlochry Elementary, a Success for All (SFA) school, participated in district professional development largely on an individual basis, and the district had few strategies for promoting collaboration or inquiry among teachers from the same school. Professional community remained low at Pitlochry throughout the study.

Youngs also found that districts were more likely to help schools strengthen or maintain high levels of professional community and program coherence when their policies were internally coherent and remained consistent over time. For example, Renfrew’s district provided support for inquiry groups for many years, as well as autonomy for schools to make decisions about professional development. On the other hand, Pitlochry’s district implemented policies related to curriculum, assessment, and professional development over the course of the study that sent conflicting signals to schools. For example, the district required a standardized reading assessment, which many staff at Pitlochry felt was inconsistent with SFA reading. Further, the district required teachers to participate in math workshops that were unrelated to SFA math.

Finally, Youngs’ study indicates that districts can help schools build capacity through either centralized or decentralized approaches to professional development and school improvement. Kintyre’s district had a more centralized approach, which featured the use of consolidated plan requirements and district resource teachers. Their approach helped the school maintain a high level of capacity. At the same time, the two schools with the highest levels of capacity throughout the study, Lewis and Renfrew, were in districts that had decentralized approaches.    Renfrew’s district, for example, offered 8 days of professional development, which were controlled by individual schools. In Lewis’s district, schools had 4 days for professional development, 2 of which were controlled by schools and 2 of which were up to the discretion of individual teachers.

Reforms have uneven effects

Based on a review of empirical research, Youngs also examined the extent to which recent reforms related to professional development addressed different aspects of school capacity. The reforms included the California Subject Matter Projects (CSMPs), the use of consultants and intervisitation of schools in New York City’s District 2, student assessments in Kentucky and Maryland, and school improvement plans in South Carolina. Youngs found that these reforms generally strengthened teachers’ knowledge, skills, and dispositions but had uneven effects on other aspects of school capacity.

Ideally, professional development activities promote collaboration among teachers from the same schools in order to strengthen school capacity. In New York’s District 2, for example, grade-team meetings provided regular opportunities for consultants to introduce new disciplinary material or content and instructional strategies in subject areas, and for teachers to modify their practices and discuss their experiences with peers. In contrast, California’s CSMP summer institutes brought together teachers from different schools and introduced them to new ideas about curriculum and pedagogy. These activities provided teachers with important opportunities to share their expertise and assume leadership roles, but they also led many to identify more closely with fellow institute participants than with colleagues at their own schools. For schools where collaboration was weak, the CSMPs seem to have little positive effect on schoolwide professional community.

Youngs found that high-stakes assessment systems, such as those in Kentucky and Maryland, can cause professional development activities to be narrowly focused on introducing teachers to new assessments. It was unclear whether professional development related to the assessment systems enhanced teachers’ knowledge, skills, and dispositions or merely helped them prepare students for the assessments. If professional development focuses on helping teachers prepare students for tests without increasing teachers’ knowledge and skills or their expectations for student performance, it may not lead to instructional practices that help students engage in critical thinking, problem solving, and in-depth understanding of subject matter. Youngs found little evidence that professional development related to the assessments contributed to a school’s professional community, such as establishing shared goals for student learning or improving teacher collaboration to achieve them.

District professional development strategies must achieve a balance, Youngs says, between promoting coherence within the district and providing autonomy to individual schools. Districts can promote internal school coherence by requiring schools to focus professional development on one content area or one schoolwide reform model for an extended period. At the same time, districts must provide opportunities for school faculties to participate in making meaningful collective decisions. Although it is important for districts to promote coherence within schools, school capacity may be weakened if teachers have little role in developing improvement plans or providing input into other decisions concerning the operation of their schools.

Professional development to promote schoolwide inquiry

In a related study, WCER researcher Bruce King explored teacher professional development programs and the extent to which they promote schoolwide teacher inquiry—the degree to which educators critically examine their own and others’ beliefs and practices. Studying seven urban elementary schools over two years, King found that typical professional development activities represented the antithesis of careful inquiry. These activities tended to be imposed by external authorities without seeking significant input from teachers, and they were rarely sustained.

Often, King says, professional development is divorced from teachers’ work contexts and presents material that teachers see as irrelevant to student learning in their specific school setting. Professional development activities offered throughout a year or a period of years tend to lack consistent focus, either for individual teachers or for the school. And perhaps most important, traditional professional development mirrors traditional forms of instruction in that the learners (in this case, teachers) are passive.

In contrast, in professional development that promotes inquiry, teachers

• have considerable control over process and content;

• critically discuss issues of school mission, curriculum, instruction, or student learning;

• address areas of disagreement and entertain diverse viewpoints;

• draw upon relevant data and research to inform deliberations; and sustain a focus on a topic or problem and reach a collective decision.

Although teachers can engage in careful individual inquiry about their practice, inquiry as a collaborative activity among teachers at a school is what contributes to a school’s professional community. Teacher reflection becomes a joint responsibility that encourages teachers to work collectively toward shared understandings and commitments. Inquiry that is pursued individually by teachers in a school, even if a significant number of them are doing it, could lead to organizational fragmentation that weakens student and staff learning.

This study does not suggest that schoolwide inquiry is necessary to enhance student achievement, King says. Certain forms of instruction may be less dependent on collective inquiry. Some schools may not be ready at a particular point in time; for other schools, attention to other matters (e.g., teacher instructional knowledge and skill in a particular subject area) may appropriately take precedence in the short term.

Yet King found that sustained schoolwide inquiry at two schools strengthened other aspects of their professional communities—shared commitment to learning goals, collaboration, and teacher influence. Collective inquiry also seemed to encourage organizational growth by keeping the school focused, yet dynamic. Coupled with the research on professional community in schools and on organizational learning, the study suggests that in order to build capacity or to keep it at a high level, professional development at should promote collective schoolwide inquiry.

This research was supported by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement; the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; the Spencer Foundation; and the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. The summary report for the project, “Professional Development That Addresses School Capacity: Lessons from Urban Elementary Schools,” is available at www.wcer.wisc.edu/pdbo/grand-aje411.htm. King’s paper, “Professional Development to Promote Schoolwide Inquiry,” is available at  www.wcer.wisc.edu/pdbo/INQ6.htm. See Youngs’ “District and State Influences on Professional Development and School Capacity” at www.wcer.wisc.edu/pdbo/pol1py-oeri.htm. Youngs’ paper, “Connections Between District Policy Relatedto Professional Development and School Capacity in Urban Elementary Schools,” is available online at www.wcer.wisc.edu/pdbo/pol2py-oeri.htm.