Continuing Education Option
Identifying Appropriate PD
Planning Your Own PD, Lesson 5. Section 3

State and federal definitions of high-quality PD should be used in identifying appropriate PD and planning your own professional growth opportunities.

 As a CEO candidate, you should be selective in the quest to improve your knowledge as you find ways of teaching students more effectively. The suggestions offered in this lesson are really just a beginning. You will discover that the content area(s) and your geographic location offer a variety of opportunities for potential growth activities. 

There are also some things to keep in mind when planning your PD. According to the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) Guidelines effective PD is:

• directly focused on helping to achieve student learning goals and supporting student learning needs.
• a collaborative endeavor – teachers and administrators work together in planning and implementation.
• school-based and job-embedded.
• a long-term commitment.
• differentiated.

Selecting PD Activities

As you search for CEO growth opportunities, you should try to select PD activities that begin at the awareness level on the chart provided and move to the refinement level.

You will need to incorporate your six hours of graduate courses.  These must align as closely as possible to your CEO Plan.

There are several sources that provide information about PD, paying close attention to the information provided by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (Continuing Education - Professional Development - Teachers - NCLB), the Kentucky Department of Education, and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). 

 Federal PD Guidelines

 Keep in mind that you will want to engage in high-quality professional development. 

  PD includes, but is not limited to, activities that:

•  improve and increase teachers’ knowledge of academic subjects and enable teachers to become highly-qualified.
• are an integral part of broad school-wide and district-wide educational improvement plans.
• give teachers and principals the knowledge and skills to help students meet challenging state academic standards.
• improve classroom management skills.
• are sustained, intensive, and classroom-focused and are not one-day or short-term workshops.
• advance teacher understanding of effective instruction strategies that are based on scientifically based research.
• are developed with extensive participation of teachers, principals, parents, and administrators.

  See the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) PD Standards for a complete description.

PD:  

• is aligned with KDE/Kentucky Board of Education goals and priorities 
• is job‐embedded and includes follow‐up. 
• is focused on what learners are to know and be able to do.
• actively engages learners.
• develops leadership capacity 
• is data‐driven and results‐driven.
• fosters an effective learning community.
• facilitates the removal of barriers to learning.
• is planned collaboratively.
• fosters a comprehensive, long‐range change process.
• is grounded in the critical attributes of adult pedagogy.

Supporting Your Goals and Objectives
At this point, you have developed a draft of your goals and objectives and have a rough idea of the time frame in which you will conduct your remaining CEO phases. You should begin looking at some of the selected professional development activities that will support your goals and objectives.

 A good plan needs a well-developed potential list of appropriate activities. You will research and participate in numerous additional professional growth activities as you continue through the CEO process.   When you submit your final CEO Portfolio you will provide artifacts that demonstrate the PD activities have positively impacted your growth over-time and improved student achievement.