Professional learning plans are the navigation systems that support educator and student learning. They bring your team together under a common vision and help you map out the steps to achieve it. Continue reading to discover more about developing a comprehensive professional learning plan from Learning Forward Senior Consultant Terry Morganti-Fisher.
Why is it important to have a comprehensive professional learning plan?
“When you are developing a comprehensive professional learning plan at a district level, you give structure to organizational learning. You ask questions and search for solutions. For example, what do we need to know and be able to do as an organization to support our schools and educators so that our children learn? How do we give access to the best professional learning to our teachers?
“If we don’t do that, then we end up with random acts of professional development. This happens when everyone is doing their own thing. In this situation the system can’t learn from itself. Instead, you want to create a framework so that everyone knows how they can best support the schools You do that by having a comprehensive learning plan.
“You look at where you are at, where you need to go, where the gaps are, and what programs are needed. Then you can begin collaborating and learning from each other. You ask questions. What does it look like from elementary to secondary? How many novice teachers do we have? How many novice principals do we have? Who is reaching mastery? How do we want to support all of these teachers? It’s all important when considering a comprehensive learning plan.”
Learning Forward Senior Consultant Terry Morganti-Fisher
