portfolio // principle 4 | reflection 1
“Candidates view and conduct themselves as professionals, providing leadership in their chosen field, including effective communication and collaboration with students and stakeholders.”
// interpret
This principle addresses behavior fitting to a member of a profession. Like any professionals—doctors, lawyers, journalists—teachers have an obligation to continually improve their own practice through professional development. In addition, teachers must improve their practice through conversations not only with other professionals, but also with those immediately affected by that practice—students, parents, community members, and other stakeholders in the educational endeavor. Those who engage in thorough, thoughtful professional development are those who become leaders of the profession.
This reflection focuses on leadership within the teaching profession and professional development that arises from conversation among educators.
// select
To demonstrate my participation in professional development, I have selected a variety of materials related to my participation in the 2009 School of Education Research to Practice Symposium as a member of the planning committee. Specifically, the artifacts are as follows:
· The event program, which I designed in conjunction with committee co-chairs Beth Bader and Mary Bratsch. [P4.R1.A1]
· Sample minutes from two planning committee meetings, dated February 26, 2009 and March 18, 2009. [P4.R1.A2 and P4.R1.A3]
· My own notes from the second breakout session I attended, which was an overview of the Elementary School Success Profile[1] assessment tool. [P4.R1.A4]
· Screenshots from the 2009 Research to Practice Symposium Wiki, which I designed in conjunction with fellow MAT member Trisha Klein (available online at http://uncsoe.pbwiki.com). [P4.R1.A5]
// describe
My involvement with the Symposium Planning Committee began when MAT Program Director Dr. Jim Trier recommended me for a seat on the committee as a member of the student community. I emailed committee co-chair Beth Bader to confirm my interest, and on February 26, I attended my first committee meeting.
The purpose of the Symposium as described to me at this first meeting was to bring together members of the academic research community and education practitioners, with the ultimate hope of creating a conversation that might bridge the gap between the two. We discussed as a committee the idea that academic research too often seems to exist apart from concrete practice on the classroom level; researchers are too often seen as using students and teachers as guinea pigs—observing and recording their behavior, but doing little to improve it. The committee’s aim in planning the Symposium was to develop more positive, co-operative ideas about research and practice through a discussion of researchers’ obligations to the schools they work in, as well as practitioners’ ability to be active members of the research community rather than solely its subjects.
This conversation would revolve around four current examples of education research: FirstSchool, the Durham Freedom School, the Research Triangle Schools Partnership, and the Elementary School Success Profile[2]. These projects would each present a brief description of their work, then participate in a panel discussion in which they answered audience questions. After the panel discussion, each project would have its own afternoon breakout session to speak about more specific aspects of their research and how it could translate into practice. We encouraged all members of the educational community to be part of our audience—School of Education graduate and undergraduate students, university faculty, local teachers and administrators, and any other interested persons.
After two months of planning, the Symposium took place on April 24, 2009. Though the event was not without its glitches and went more lightly attended than the committee members had hoped, it nevertheless achieved its basic purpose of continuing a dialogue between researchers and practitioners. In addition, this year’s event further solidified the foundations of the annual Symposium so that, in the future, it might grow to become the major educational event that the committee first envisioned.
// analyze
My participation on the Symposium Planning Committee addresses this principle in terms of both leadership among educators and my own professional development. In agreeing to take part in the planning of the Symposium, I added a new dimension to my teaching identity. I was no longer simply a classroom teacher; in some sense (however small), my participation on the committee meant I was participating in the growth of the teaching profession. In helping to plan the symposium, I helped foster a meaningful conversation about the growth and betterment of education.
My work with Trisha Klein to develop the Symposium wiki further signifies leadership among educators. Because of prior experience in creating wikis, Trisha and I offered our services to bring the Symposium into the 21st century. We developed the site with keen attention to both a clean, simple appearance and rich content. This online presence became not just a place to post information about the Symposium itself, but a repository for a variety of educational resources across disciplines. Our intent is for the wiki to remain online not only so that it might be used for future Symposiums, but also serve as a general gathering place for educators in need of content-area-related resources.
My attendance at the Symposium event itself also represented my first professional development activity. By listening to the panel discussion, I learned about a host of research projects I was previously unfamiliar with. More importantly, I began to consider how those projects could inform my own practice. In particular, the Elementary School Success Profile seemed to provide a wide, highly organized array of practical solutions to problems I might encounter in my teaching. Even if I only rarely use this resource or any other that I encountered through the Symposium, my professional development has still grown in the sense that I now have an incrementally greater awareness of the educational community and my colleagues’ work within it.
// appraise
As a member of the Planning Committee, I can say with some certainty that this year’s Symposium was a mixed success. As with any event of this size, the Symposium had some mild problems such as logistical hiccups and rather sparse attendance.
Perhaps the biggest issue was the Symposium’s somewhat vague purpose. Early in the planning process, many of the research projects we asked to attend were unsure about exactly what was expected of them as key presenters. Though we knew our overall intent was to discuss the connection between research and practice, I never felt it became fully clear either to the committee or the attendees exactly what this meant. In the future, the Symposium’s purpose statement—its thesis, if you will—should provide a clearer, more specific focus for discussion.
Still, even with its flaws, the Symposium was a valuable event. Meaningful conversations did happen, and I came out of the experience with new resources to use in the classroom as well as experience working as part of the educational academia.
// transform
The most important transformation the Symposium can undergo is the development of a clearly stated purpose. This might be achieved by centering each Symposium around a single question—for example, “How can teachers put research into practice?” Developing a more effective purpose statement would inevitably also require discussion between the committee and all Symposium participants to ensure each group understands the wants, needs, and goals of the others. With this improvement, the discussion fostered by the Symposium can only become more fruitful and thus more valuable as a professional development activity.
[1] Developed by the UNC School of Social Work. More information online at www.schoolsuccessonline.com/ESSP.asp.
[2] Full descriptions of each research project can be found in the Symposium program (P4.R1.A1).
