Teachers’ staff training sorely lacking

February 5, 2009 — Chattanooga, TN — According to an Education Week article published today, the fact that U.S. students routinely post below-average scores on international exams is caused, at least in part from a failing of the United States’ systems for supporting professional learning. This finding was drawn from the recently released report from the National Staff Development Council (NSDC).

The report states that American teachers continue to spend more working hours in classrooms than those in top-performing European and Asian countries, yet suffer from a lack of on on-the-job training compared to their international peers. As a result, teacher effectiveness suffers.

According to Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University professor who co-wrote the report, “we’re way behind other countries that are high-achieving in terms of the time and intensive opportunity for deep learning they provide. We still see teachers engage in really short one- and two-day workshops rather than ongoing, sustained support that we now have evidence changes practices and increases student achievement.”

Part of the problem stems from a lack of “clarity and purposefulness” in spending criteria for professional development. “Right now, if you look at Title II, pretty much anything can be done with respect to professional development,” says Darling-Hammond.

The report contends that the alignment of other countries’ professional development and instructional practices “suggest[s] that there may be some connection between the opportunities for teacher development and the quality of teaching and learning that result.”

Experts from across the U.S. seem to agree with and support the report findings.

Susan K. Sclafani, a former George W. Bush administration official who has studied teacher development in Singapore, wrote in an e-mail, “If we want professional teachers, we need to treat them like professionals. That means ensuring that they are accountable for results, but giving them the professional autonomy to teach well. That means that they work together on addressing ‘difficult cases,’ children who do not learn easily to high levels, rather than decide they have taught [a lesson] and it is the child’s problem if he or she did not learn.”

The NSDC report earned enthusiastic praise from the American Federation of Teachers, which agrees with the conclusion that teachers should be give more decision-making authority.

Ms. Sclafani, currently the director of state services for the National Center on Education and the Economy, noted that several top-performing countries have stricter front-end selection criteria for teachers, larger class sizes, and longer hours to facilitate on-site professional learning. The United States, in contrast, typically has lax entry standards and smaller classes, and the majority of teachers receive no more than 16 hours of training in their subject per year.

“If we want to be a high-performing nation, we need to change our system and our practices,” Ms. Sclafani said. “Our children are no different.”

Read the entire Education Week article.

Download “NSDC Professional Learning in the Learning Profession: A Status Report on Teacher Development in the U.S. and Abroad” [pdf]