Describes the role of boundary spanners, who facilitate the development of school/university partnerships. After describing the ideal partnership, offers examples of real issues that emerge when building partnerships and analyzes the surreal aspects of boundary spanning. Concludes with specific suggestions for developing school/university…

Categorizes and critiques the body of literature around the Holmes Group's three reports regarding the treatment of teaching and teacher education ("Tomorrow's Teachers,""Tomorrow's Schools," and "Tomorrow's Schools of Education"). Discusses three themes found in the literature (gender, professionalism, and…

Describes multiple aspects of the site coordinator's role in K-12/university partnerships where a master teacher was the site coordinator. Interview data highlight multiple themes within the areas of personal and professional benefits and challenges. Overall, site coordinators learned to walk in two worlds nd became an accepted part of the culture…

Compared Professional Development School (PDS) and non-PDS graduates regarding retention in teaching, teaching effectiveness, and perceptions of professional preparation. Surveys of beginning teachers and principals found no differences in teacher retention. Principals rated PDS graduates higher in some aspects of teaching effectiveness. PDS…

Investigated preservice teachers' beliefs about and understanding and use of reflection, interviewing preservice teachers who, together with their mentors, used a reflective framework in the context of a Professional Development School. Results indicated that the use of the framework helped develop preservice teachers who actively thought about…

A study of five mentors in a K-5 professional development school investigated how mentors talk about their theories of how novices learn to teach, use different sources of knowledge to help novices learn to teach, and model and encourage critical reflection about critical issues in teacher education. (IAH)

Examined the role of two parents who helped design and implement a field-based teacher-preparation program at one professional-development school. Interviews with participants led to four main themes that illuminated the stages parents experienced: excluding breeds suspicion, holding our ground, saying the same thing, and establishing a new…

This article discusses the rationale for establishing the Houston Teaching Academy (HTA), a professional development school for preparing teachers to teach in multicultural inner-city schools. Program implementation is described, and results of formative and summative evaluation are presented. (IAH)

Faculty members at an elementary school in its first year as a professional development school completed interviews and classroom observations examining how their expectations and aspirations for their role developed over time. Results highlighted five assertions, most of which related to their amount of control over environment and professional…

This study investigated how undergraduate students make meaning from instances of cultural conflict within juvenile novels. Student logs, discussion groups, postwriting, and classroom observations indicated that the case method had strengths and weaknesses, but overall, it encouraged reflection on critical issues. (SM)

Investigated how Mexican-American student teachers expressed their cultural knowledge in lesson planning and implementation. Semistructured interviews with Mexican-American student teachers working in elementary Professional Development Schools revealed little ethnic expression, even when teaching Mexican-American children. They were never invited…

Using data from surveys of and interviews with teachers and principals, this study explored the impact of involvement in Professional Development Schools (PDS) on teacher professional growth and school change at seven elementary and secondary PDS sites. Results highlighted the importance of a range of context variables to program success. (SM)