US professional development lags behind other nations

US professional development lags behind other nations

By  | January 19, 2016 
Education Dive

Dive Brief:

  • Two new reports, one from the National Center on Education and Economy and one from the Center on International Education Benchmarking, reveal that professional development in the United States underperforms in comparison to that of other countries, largely due to the fact that other nations have professional development "built in" to educators' daily workloads.
  • Singapore, British Columbia, Shanghai, and Hong Kong all perform better than the United States, according to the new research, largely due to the use of collaborative PD.
  • The researchers behind the studies have also compiled a toolbox of "authentic tools," including examples and elements of teacher PD used abroad.

Dive Insight:

A proliferation of various online and personalized strategies aimed at teacher development and PD now exist, and teacher PD can be considered an avenue of the booming multimillion-dollar ed tech industry. That's partially thanks to the new standards, assessments, and tech-driven instructional approaches now being used in U.S. schools. 
 
One option for districts seeking to up their PD game are low- and no-cost online platforms and various software packages that can help streamline teacher development, while saving money and tailoring learning at the educator's own pace. Digital PD can also save money for teachers, many of whom used to need to travel to attend conferences.

Recommended Reading

eSchoolNews: Report: The major problems with U.S. professional development

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