The effects of professional development on student and teacher outcomes

By Carmen Pannone, University of Cagliari, Italy

Effective instruction by well-prepared teachers is crucial for enhancing students' reading comprehension. This process begins with high-quality professional development (PD) that enriches teachers' knowledge and improves their instructional strategies in reading comprehension.

A recent meta-analysis reviewed 29 experimental or quasi-experimental studies focused on PD for reading comprehension among teachers. It examined outcomes for both teachers and K-12 students to assess which PD components influenced teacher knowledge, instructional practices, and student reading comprehension. Utilizing random-effects robust variance estimation, the analysis identified significant positive effects of PD on teacher outcomes (ES = +0.95) and smaller yet still significant effects on student comprehension (ES = +0.19).

The study found that specific PD characteristics such as  coaching, format, content, providers, duration, and number of strategies did not significantly moderate teacher outcomes. Similarly, study quality characteristics (e.g., design, control group condition, outcome measure) did not show significant moderation effects, though distinctions between standardized and researcher-created measures were noted (ES=+0.11 vs. +0.44).

A notable conclusion from this study is that future research should prioritize direct testing of effective PD strategies. While the findings of this meta-analysis align with previous research, there are potential limitations in statistical power arising from substantial heterogeneity among studies. There is also a possibility that PD characteristics interact in complex ways. In addition, the notable overall positive effect on teacher outcomes should be approached with care, as a majority of measures relied on teacher observations or self-reports.