Mainely Middle
Journal of the Maine Association for Middle
Level Education
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2001/2002 |
Staff Development : It Ain't Just Three Days a YearStaff Development is "the deliberate effort to alter the professional practices, beliefs, and understandings of school personnel toward an articulated end (Dufour, 2002). I don't know about you, but I think Staff Development &endash; the Concept &endash; has come a long way in the past twenty years, especially at the middle level. I can remember when the words "Staff Development" had the same effect as "Tax Audit" or "Root Canal." Staff Development wasn't something you did: it was something someone did to you. Remember those whole-district meetings where we were all subjected to three two-hour presentations on head lice, writing across the curriculum, and assertive discipline in one day! I have also experienced the other end of the spectrum &endash; from the sublime to the ridiculous. Like the dysfunctional magician who was hired to entertain us one staff development day years ago, and we all watched in horror as he wilted on the stage beneath the hailstorm of sarcasm from a heckler in the high school social studies department. He tried to make himself disappear. We were rooting for him at that point. Another of my staff development days began as the English Department Head appeared before the district's teachers in a chicken outfit singing a Broadway tune. That's all I remember of that particular day. Scary, huh? If principals are to succeed in their efforts to create professional learning communities, they require principals who function as staff developers (Dufour, 2002). The principal and other administrators have traditionally been the forgers of staff development, and the importance of the administrative role in staff development is still there; however, in successful schools the roles have changed so that administrators are not always the sole deliverers, but facilitators and mentors. When staff become involved in learning communities and are encouraged to explore, discover, and share their findings, staff development becomes not something done to staff, but rather something done by staff, and with staff. When other staff members are presented to by their colleagues, they can more easily become part of a learning community. Principals forge the conditions that give rise to the growth of professional learning communities in schools (Dufour, 2002). A primary benefit of the Middle Level Education Institute in Orono is what happens when the sessions are over and the presentations are done for the day. No, I'm not talking about heading to Pat's! In afternoon conversations between teams and individuals and with consultants, even late into the evenings, participants often engage in the real stuff of middle level practice and philosophy. People talk and plan together late into the night, work on a project for their schools during the week, planning and revising together with assistance from Institute consultants. Sometimes teams are accompanied by their principals; sometimes they are there independently. Usually, the teams are at the Institute to work on staff development projects like advocacy, integrated curriculum, teaming, Learning Results, brain-based learning, etc. During that week in July, the Institute becomes a professional learning center where teams work together to improve their schools. When they return to their schools, the teams are most often charged and ready to share what they learned with colleagues. Sometimes the principal's role as staff developer is to encourage teachers to take the reins in staff development. Administrators who wish to create a professional learning community in their schools will foster teacher leadership. Sometimes a principal's best staff development decision is to allow teachers to take on the roles of staff developers themselves! Creating a collaborative culture is the single most important factor for successful school improvement initiatives and the first order of business for those seeking to enhance the effectiveness of their schools (Dufour, 2002). This year, the five teachers who returned from the Middle Level Education Institute to Auburn Middle School brought with them a renewed commitment to advocacy. This had been their focus at the Institute. On the first staff development day, this team of five orchestrated the presentation of the Fish video and philosophy, followed by an invigorating refocus on advocacy. The staff loved the Fish video with its messages to Play, Be There, Make Their Day, and Choose Your Attitude. Advocacy has been one of the most troubled of our middle school programs, and having teachers, some of whom were skeptical about advocacy in the past, take the lead in presenting our advocacy program did more to promote the program than anything, or anyone, else has done in the past three years. The excitement of fellow teachers made it successful staff development for the rest. Last year five teachers, including three team leaders, attended the MLEI. When they returned, they began a book group focusing on their project on engaging unmotivated students. Choosing Lou Ann Johnson's book, One Part Text Book, Two Parts Love, these five teachers, an administrator, and another teacher met every three weeks to discuss the reading. The conversations led to a homework survey of all staff members and meaningful discussions in Team Leader Meetings about how and what we teach. In these cases not everyone was involved initially. But the entire staff eventually benefited from the experiences of these two groups of teachers. Staff Development... staff to staff. Whenever [there was] an effective school, without exception, that school or department has been a part of a professional learning community (Dufour, 2002). One July evening at the Institute last summer, Tom Gatewood, a professor at Virginia Tech University, talked about staff development and the importance of staff development being implemented throughout the day, not three to five times a year. In middle schools with daily team meeting times, the opportunity for regular staff development in the course of day exists, but it must be staff development that is meaningful to the team. Team Leader groups may become a collaborative learning community. This can be a first step toward the teams themselves becoming collaborative learning communities. In some schools the entire school is instantly transformed into a Collaborative Learning Community, but more often the transformation is gradual. We are not yet a Collaborative Learning Community, but we are getting there. Many of our teachers are leading the charge. And we know this: the best staff development will be delivered to staff by staff and by collaborative administrators. There is no magic involved... and no one has to wear a chicken suit. To improve schools through creation of a Collaborative Culture, staff must become professional learning communities; schools must develop a collaborative culture; schools should overcome a tradition of teacher isolation; to overcome this isolation of teachers, teachers need to work in effective high performing teams (Dufour, 2002). *Quotations are all from, The Principal as Staff Developer, a presentation at the March 16, 2001, ASCD Pre-Conference by Richard P. Dufour, Superintendent, Adlai Stevenson High School in Illinois.
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