Is the PD day broken? Professional development days may do l

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Is the PD day broken? Professional development days may do little to improve teaching

Tristin Hopper Apr 20, 2012 – 10:41 PM ET | Last Updated: Apr 22, 2012 9:30 AM ET

This month, Bill Whelan told the P.E.I. Ministry of Education it was time to take a long, hard look at PD, or “professional development,” days. A medical physicist at the University of P.E.I., Prof. Whelan was co-chair of a one-year commission tasked with modernizing the province’s school system. Among 48 recommendations was a prominent call for PD reform: Parents found the days a nuisance, teachers found them a waste of time — and they did not even work. Their effectiveness is “questionable, at best,” said Prof. Whelan. If Canada’s smallest province had any hope of boosting student learning, old-­fashioned PD days had to go.

Since at least the 1970s, school calendars across Canada have contained four to eight “professional development days,” a mysterious day where school buses are parked, students stay home and teachers gather in empty classrooms to figure out the latest ways to get kids to absorb lessons on math and science. Nevertheless, after 40 years, exasperated principals and bored teachers are starting to say what students have suspected for decades; the Canadian PD day is broken.

“I think they’re just a one-shot deal, a bit of a taste of this, a bit of a taste of that, it’s nothing substantial, nothing that’s going to change your way of thinking, necessarily,” said Geoff Johnson, a retired B.C. superintendent. “It feels good at the time, but what’s the takeaway from it?”
If you’re just going to have a day available to say, ‘We’re going to get together to improve the climate of the school, what does that mean?’

Across Canada, the bimonthly days have spawned a cottage industry of PD activities and day camps serving parents who struggle to find alternative child-care arrangements. Talia Erickson owns Buddings, a ­flexible-hours daycare in central Vancouver. Her usual charges are two- and three-year-olds, but on PD days the daycare is flooded with five-year-old kindergartners. “On the philosophical side … we want to support the teachers and make sure they’re happy educating our kids,” said Ms. Erickson. “But on the more practical side, people are needing to scramble to find child care.”

The B.C. Education Plan makes note of the PD animosity: “on Pro D days, parents make alternative arrangements for their children and they need to be assured that these days are used as intended.”

Occasionally, they aren’t. Last September, the staff at B.C.’s Eric Hamber Secondary School scheduled a PD retreat complete with Frisbee, ping pong and foosball. After the schedule was leaked to The Vancouver Sun by way of an anonymous brown envelope, the retreat garnered condemnation from the Education Ministry and the teachers’ union alike.

Two years ago, the Toronto District School Board gathered all its teachers for a $130,000 September rally at the Air Canada Centre including performances by jazz singer Nikki Yanofsky and swag bags imprinted with the slogan “Believe it!” “I think it’s important to build a sense of energy and momentum before the school year begins,” board director Chris Spence explained in a public letter...........http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/04/20 ... ay-broken/

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More school PD days recommended
CBC News
Posted: Apr 12, 2012 12:04 PM AT
Last Updated: Apr 12, 2012 2:04 PM AT
Teachers on P.E.I. should be receiving more training throughout the school year, says the Education Governance Commission, and that could mean shorter school days or a longer school year.

The commission, whose report was made public last week, wants government to make room in the calendar for more professional development for teachers. Currently, five days are set aside when teachers devote themselves to learning and children get the day off school.

"It's insufficient," said commission co-chair Bill Whelan.

"Those jurisdictions where professional development is embedded, ongoing on a regular basis in the school calendar, students in those jurisdictions do much better."

Lauren Gill-O'Brien has been teaching at Vernon River Consolidated for 10 years and has confidence in her abilities, but she acknowledges there's always more to learn.

"We can't get enough of it," said Gill-O'Brien.
Students do better in jurisdictions where there is more professional development, says Bill Whelan.Students do better in jurisdictions where there is more professional development, says Bill Whelan. (CBC)

"Even after 10 years I'm still trying to do a better job and assess students better. New curriculum comes out, new resources come out, so we're constantly trying to better our teaching."

The commission is recommending a big increase in PD days. It suggest schools could follow other jurisdictions, and block off a half day every week for PD or one day every two weeks. But Whelan said it is important not to lose instructional time, so school days would have to be extended, or the school year made longer.

The P.E.I. Teachers' Federation would like to see more professional development, but it believes that more effective teaching could make up for lost instructional time.

"It's the quality of time spent with the children in the classroom versus the quantity of time," said federation president Gilles Arsenault.
Problems for parents

While more professional development would be a good thing, said Vernon River School principal Dave Wood, he worries about the problems that could be created by a system that had kids going to school for just four days every other week...........http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/prince-ed ... s-584.html