Teacher & Leader Development

The centerpiece of the Collaborative’s action agenda is teacher and administrator professional development. The Collaborative’s largest and most significant investment is aimed at building the capacity of teachers to teach high-level content to all students and of leaders to create and sustain effective schools that ensure high achievement among all students.

The Collaborative’s professional development program is intensive, long-term, and coordinated. Training is provided in a variety of formats, ranging from small workshops to large group institutes.

The program begins by creating an urgency for change in teaching and learning school-wide, and uses student achievement data to raise issues of equity. In order to create more active and sustained learning, the Collaborative requires that teachers attend in teams accompanied by their principal or assistant principal. Many training sessions examine student work against state and national standards to make clear the need for change and to inform decisions about instructional improvement. Instructional coaches, certified in mathematics and science, are also utilized to deliver professional development during content institutes and at school sites. In schools and classrooms, coaches model best practices in teaching specific content and address the engagement of students in learning at deeper and more meaningful levels.

Strengthening the skills and knowledge of school leaders is central to improving student achievement, raising content standards and the quality of curricular programs, and improving teacher quality. Toward this end, the Collaborative offers leadership development seminars and workshops to assist campus and district leaders in identifying effective teaching and content delivery in classrooms, in developing and implementing plans for improving classroom teaching school-wide, implementing rigorous curricula to accelerate learning for all students, recruiting and selecting effective teachers, supporting the development of all teachers, and establishing data-tracking and other systems that promote quality learning.

Parent engagement is also critical to the Collaborative’s reform agenda. Professional development for parents is offered on a regular basis to help parents understand the important role they must play in school improvement and to assist them in developing strategies for working with teachers and school leaders toward improving teaching and learning for all students.

Teacher Development

Good teachers form the foundation of good schools, and improving teachers’ skills and knowledge is among the Collaborative’s highest priorities. The Collaborative’s teacher professional development program focuses on:

strengthening teachers’ knowledge of specific content and of how to teach that content;
deepening teachers’ understanding of how students learn particular subject matter, such as mathematics and science, and of what makes the learning of specific topics easier or more challenging—the preconceptions or misconceptions that students bring with them to the learning of the most important concepts;
implementing effective instructional strategies and practices related to specific subject matter and shown to deepen students’ understanding of the content;
utilizing curricular materials and assessments used by teachers in their classrooms as the context within which to provide professional development; and
aligning teacher learning to state and national standards.

Leadership Development

In order to build and sustain school capacity for change and improvement, principals and other school leaders must extend their knowledge about instructional leadership, learn to implement behaviors that lead to improved instruction, use student achievement data to focus on issues of equity and excellence, learn to make budget decisions that support improvements in teaching, and work collaboratively with the full school community to ensure success for all students.

To meet these needs, the Collaborative provides assistance, support, and resources to school leaders through its Leadership Development Program that consists of:

Principals’ Academies,
Content- Leadership Seminars, and
School Teams Leadership Institutes

Parent Development

Throughout its history, the Collaborative has put into place a range of programs aimed at building the capacity of parent to function as full, active partners in the education of their children.

Toward that end, two major activities have been implemented: Parent Leadership Institutes and the Parent Education Network.