The author spends a lot of time thinking about good professional learning vs. typical professional development. Based on her 20-plus years of experience, as well as a bit of inspiration from Reuben Duncan, assistant superintendent in School Administrative Unit 29 in Keene, N.H., she shares what she considers to be the ten best ways to waste…

The concept of growth contracting in higher education and the applications and limitations of growth plans are examined. In addition, critical steps in the process of developing contracts with faculty are identified. A professional growth plan is a binding agreement, which helps faculty and institutional representatives clarify specific goals.…

To effectively respond to the increased focus on educational accountability, teacher education institutions must integrate curriculum courses into their general programs of study. (LH)

The profession of adult education provides many excellent opportunities to enhance global understanding. One way for adult educators to become involved in international activities is through the International Council for Adult Education (ICAE). As a federation of adult education organizations that are organized in seven regions throughout the…

Ways in which the resources of a university's special education, communication arts, and library services can be combined with those of special education consortiums or parent organizations to provide exceptional children and their parents and teachers with high-quality cable educational television programs that meet their varied needs are…

Faculty can be helpful by providing commentaries to newspaper op-ed pages, but such a public relations program requires consistency, tact, good internal communications, thoughtfulness, and marketing skills. (MSE)

Describes current attitudes toward staff development through inservice education, the need to coordinate staff evaluation and inservice programs, and the leadership required of administrators and committees. Particular attention is paid to basing inservice programs on needs expressed by teachers. The program followed in Fort Lee (New Jersey) is…

Assesses four institutional renewal considerations related to inservice education: (1) motivating factors for participation; (2) value of organizational and curricular change as vehicles for program content; (3) four phases of inservice education (i.e., feasibility assessment, development, implementation, and evaluation); and (4) dimensions of…

Educators are successfully incorporating electronic mail into elementary and secondary classrooms. This paper refers to an article by Hugh Barr which describes a variety of instructional programs that use electronic mail as part of the social studies curriculum. Barr notes that essential components of interschool e-mail are purpose, structure, and…

If schools rush into Back-to-Basics the way they once rushed into open education, educational quality will not improve and the positive, humanistic attributes of progressive education may be lost. Change must be slowly and carefully planned and provide adequate support to the teachers who must implement it. (SJL)

Firm planning objectives, clearly stated relationships to overall institutional objectives, faculty involvement, and active leadership are advocated for successful academic planning. Faculty involvement is dependent on the strength of the technical, marketing, and budgeting staffs, and involvement in the planning process may kindle faculty…

Current inservice programs are criticized on the grounds that they do not achieve the objective of improving teachers' mastery of their subjects. It is suggested that these programs can be improved by increasing professional communication between teachers, providing more assistance from specialized consultants, increasing teacher participation in…

In order to provide credit-bearing programs directed toward the specific in-service needs and concerns of elementary and secondary teachers and administrators, schools, colleges and departments of education are at last beginning to utilize much needed input concerning professor selection, the type of credit activity, scheduling activities, and…

A definition of staff development/inservice education is given. Problem areas concerning the inservice education activities of professional organizations include: (1) the balance of political influences on inservice education; (2) a desire for control of inservice education on the part of teachers instead of collaboration; and (3) an increasing…

An essay encouraging and illustrating possibilities for faculty involvement in college planning and decision making is followed by commentaries by Harmon C. Dunathan and George Keller. Among the issues addressed are program review, personnel strategies, and situations of financial exigency. (MSE)