Information about the experiences successful leaders perceive as vital to their development can be helpful to one's understanding of resiliency. Such information can also offer insights into the ways successful leaders use positive and negative situations as learning opportunities and the strategies they implement in addressing adversity. The…

The steps of implementing, analyzing, refining, and re-implementing a lesson is referred to as "lesson study." These steps formed the basis of a "workshop study" model that can be used to analyze a professional development workshop for the purposes of tailoring the content, resources, and collaborative efforts to better meet the needs of the…

This study explored the impact of learning a new instructional practice in a US school district that places great value in a statewide student assessment. Grounded Theory methodology (Strauss & Corbin, 1998, Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory, 2nd Edition, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA)…

The purpose of this study was to monitor the development of teacher personal attribute and school environmental factors at an urban intermediate (years 7 and 8) school in New Zealand as a result of an extended science professional development intervention project. Over a 2-year period, a validated, comprehensive science curriculum delivery…

Given the importance of preparing administrators who can lead school improvement efforts, the purpose of this article is to explore ways in which the knowledge and skills about leadership for school improvement obtained in preparation programs can be transferred to the workplace. The author begins by examining the concept of transfer, particularly…

Many educators have suggested that teachers hold the authority, and thus the responsibility, for initiating the curricular and instructional changes made within their own classrooms. One implication of this suggestion is that teachers be reflective about their practice. Yet, reflection is a difficult process that requires critical thought,…

Introduction: Evaluating competencies required for professional practice is a matter of particular current interest. Its importance lies in improvements that can be made in both preparatory and ongoing training and development processes. This paper summarizes results obtained from a recent investigation regarding this issue. Method: A total of 76…

This research study examined the role of instructional design knowledge in the development of teaching expertise for university teaching assistants (TAs). ID theoretically supports the development of systematic and meaningful patterns of cognitive organization that characterize teaching expertise. Therefore, it should support TAs in developing…

Over the past twenty years American education has seen many changes, and most notable have been those related to accountability and assessment. One aspect of these changes has been the movement toward more specified student learning outcomes. In discipline after discipline content standards have been developed outlining that which students should…

Professional development schools (PDSs) are collaborative partnerships between teacher education programs and K-12 schools that provide educational opportunities for teachers and students alike. Such school-university partnerships are an important part of current educational reform. The body of empirical research examining PDS partnerships is…

A review of United States-based two-year (82), four-year (38), and graduate (68) addictions professional preparation programs indicated that the discipline lacks consistency regarding name, whether preparation has a science or arts academic foundation, whether preparation has an academic or technical base, and what department or academic unit…

A two-year qualitative study of mathematics and English teachers in two urban comprehensive high schools investigated how teacher community serves as resource for teacher development and school reform. A school engaged in whole-school reform sustained high teacher commitment and school-level community by constituting professional community…

Both the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future and the Holmes Group suggest that the solution to improving student learning is through formal university-school collaborations, or Professional Development Schools (PDSs). As the research base on PDS partnerships grows, so does the evidence that PDSs improve the quality of teaching in…

Since 1995, the author has been the university music educator responsible to a professional development partnership. Over an 8-year span, she has collected narratives of experience from approximately 100 pre-service music teachers, following, to some extent, the research model of Connelly and Clandinin. In developing their notion of "personal…

What role can online communities play in meeting the informal learning needs of a professional association? This article presents the results of an interpretive study of the experiences of coordinators of Alberta Community Adult Learning Councils who participated in an online community of practice designed to support informal workplace learning.…