We present a model for Professional Development (PD) for in-service generalist primary teachers of science. The Remote Classroom Modelling (RCM) model is specifically designed to address salient challenges in the context of professional isolation. We share the principles that supported the design of this PD prototype, and the insights and lessons…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to test the model first presented by Federici and Skaalvik (2012) involving the relationships among four attributes of principals' work--self-efficacy, burnout, job satisfaction, and intention to leave (persistence). The model is then extended to test the role of isolation as a precursor.…

This article presents a professional development programme which brought an indigenous minority group of tertiary staff together. We describe a peer-mentoring model, piloted in 2009 at The University of Auckland, New Zealand with university staff in order to promote staff advancement. The participants were all Maori, the indigenous people of New…

Prior learning assessment (PLA) is a non-traditional component of higher education that recognizes that life experiences and learning from outside of academia can be deemed valid and awarded college credit. This qualitative study explored the perceptions of faculty assessors of PLA portfolios. This study sought to understand, through a…

Various models of providing for the inclusion of children with disabilities and special needs exist in different European countries. Central to all these models is the notion that support for children and teachers is pivotal in ensuring effective inclusion. This article draws from three qualitative studies on the role, employment and deployment of…

In 2000, the author took over the leadership of a large elementary school located in a small community in western Pinellas County, Florida. During her first year, the student population was around 950 students in kindergarten through fifth grade. Today the school population is around 750 students, with 93 percent being white students who live in…

Connecting with other education professionals is important in supporting teacher learning. Teachers in remote locations in Australia experience a professional isolation due to geographic isolation that makes it difficult to engage in sustained collaborations with other teachers. In a national project ICT was used to assist these teachers by…

In Australia, concerns about the quality of mathematics education that students experience are particularly salient in rural schools. These schools typically report great difficulty in attracting and retaining qualified teachers of mathematics. Teachers in non-metropolitan locations may also experience professional isolation if they have limited…

Furman Brown has spent over a decade figuring out how to design a better school. As a first-year teacher in South Central Los Angeles in the early 1990s, he got a taste of what was wrong with the traditional public school model: It was not designed to serve students "or" teachers well. Convinced there was a better way to organize and…

Counselors sometimes struggle with professional challenges, a situation that can be more difficult with a lack of support among colleagues. Finding an alternative community of support can make a crucial difference for well being. Recommendations are drawn from kinship networks of the Maoris of New Zealand to demonstrate how they can serve as a…

This paper presents a model of graduate education for advanced teachers and aspiring school administrators that establishes and fosters the foundations for the development of the professional community in schools. Graduate students enrolled in the first distance-education cohort of a new graduate-degree program became cognizant of the need and…

This book on ethics in higher education examines the current condition of faculty isolation and organizational fragmentation, and the concomitant "insistent individualism" at many institutions. A philosophical model that reflects the academy in its current state is suggested, along with an alternative relational model that involves creation of an…

Australian society in the 1990s has been marked by the gradual disenfranchisement of rural communities due to the urban bias of political and economic decision-makers. In Victoria, curriculum changes based on strategic centralism, consumer capture, and educational accountability were accompanied by a more controlled, urban-biased approach to…

The Regional Inservice Training Model (RIST-M) was used to develop a weeklong inservice summer training program at Idaho State University for professionals working with deaf and hearing-impaired students in rural Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming. There were several reasons for offering inservice training on a regional basis: a mission of…

Using the Professional Development School (PDS) model of teacher preparation, a Midwestern university created the potential for teacher candidates to become immersed into the environment of an elementary school. The question this study explored was, "Does increased immersion at a PDS site impact preparation of teacher candidates?" Themes emerged…