Drawing on research in the sociology of professions as a reference point, this study examines the practices and perceptions of professional accountants towards the requirements of IES7 on continuing professional development (CPD). Responses from 1310 accountants in the Asia Pacific region suggest while increasing globalisation has led to more…

This brief documents the expansion of instructional specialist staffing in U.S. public school districts. We use data from the National Center of Education Statistics' annual Common Core of Data to chart staffing trends in public school districts between 1997-98 and 2012-13. The number of instructional specialists per 1,000 U.S students doubled…

This brief documents the expansion of instructional specialist staffing in U.S. public school districts. We use data from the National Center of Education Statistics' annual Common Core of Data to chart staffing trends in public school districts between 1997-1998 and 2012-2013. The number of instructional specialists per 1,000 U.S students doubled…

Increasingly universities aim to provide students with opportunities to graduate with skills ready to perform in the workplace. However, workplace-based opportunities for students enrolled in foreign policy subjects are more limited due to the diplomatic and sensitive political nature of the professional work. Thus there exists a need for higher…

In the focus article of this issue, von Davier, Naemi, and Roberts essentially coupled: (1) a short methodological review of structural similarities of latent variable models with discrete and continuous latent variables; and (2) 2 short empirical case studies that show how these models can be applied to real, rather than simulated, large-scale…

This article presents one approach to providing geography education training to pre-service teachers--a two-day, professional development conference dedicated to preservice teachers and provided to them at no cost. The authors begin by explaining more fully the need for reaching pre-service teachers with good training in geography education. A…

The focus of this article is two-fold. First, it describes a model that can be used to guide the evaluation of teacher professional development. The model combines important components of existing models and incorporates the use of students' perceptions for examining teacher change. Second, the article reports the evaluation of a teacher…

This study examined critical features of secondary special educator's experiences with transition professional development to predict variables most likely to influence performance of transition planning and services. Results included the extent to which secondary special educators are prepared to perform transition practices, the relationship…

Repeated assessments of literacy skills have shown that Aboriginal students do not achieve at the same level as their non-Aboriginal peers. Many Aboriginal students speak Aboriginal English, a dialect different from the Standard Australian English used in schools. Research shows that it is crucial for educators in bidialectal contexts to be aware…

This study explores the relationships between teacher empowerment, teacher receptivity toward, and perceived outcomes of, a system-wide curriculum change, particularly national curriculum reform in basic education in China. The results of a survey of 1,646 teachers from six provinces indicate that teachers were positive in their receptivity and…

There is wide agreement that the well-paying jobs of the future will require postsecondary credentials. But for many students attending community college, developmental (or remedial) classes in reading, composition, and/or mathematics--the courses that students often must complete before they can enroll in courses that confer credit toward a…

This study expands on the work of Huerta "et al." (2008) by reexamining the relationship between professional development and teacher leadership using more comprehensive measures of each. By confirming Huerta "et al"'s (2008) finding that Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) professional development is a significant predictor of teacher…

Teachers' continuing professional development (CPD) in England is a controversial area, and there is arguably little evidence of a "coherent" framework around which consistently high-quality CPD has been developed, provided and accessed despite the establishment of the General Teaching Council in 2000, the publication of the CPD Strategy…

Based on publicly available data, the study examined the relationship between adequate yearly progress status and teachers' perceptions of the quality of their professional development. The sample included responses of 5,558 teachers who completed the questionnaire in the 2005-2006 school year. Results of the statistical analysis show a…

Research Findings: The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine the efficacy of a practice-based approach to professional development for family child care providers working in low-income communities. This approach included a literacy coaching component that anchors knowledge in practice. One hundred and twenty-eight family child care…