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Picture this:
It's 9 p.m. and you're at home in your den discussing alternative
teaching strategies with a handful of reading teachers across
the country. Or envision logging on at 6 a.m. with your morning
coffee to put the finishing touches on a class project for your
recertification. Or imagine learning the latest PowerPoint shortcuts
during your afternoon teacher planning period.
Sound good?
Your teachers think so, too. Instead of afternoon workshops or
weekend seminars, they're getting quality training that enhances
their skills whenever and wherever they want it, thanks to online
professional development.
It's no secret
that today's teachers are being given more responsibility than
ever before. Along with their regular teaching duties, they also
have to deal with new standards and high-stakes tests and new
instructional technologies. And they're are being held accountable
without being given the proper tools to succeed. A 1999 study
by the National Center for Education Statistics found that fewer
than half of all teachers felt prepared to meet the challenges
they face in today's classroom -- and fewer than 40 percent felt
"very well prepared" to implement state or district curriculum
and performance standards.
"We're still
training teachers in the same model as two centuries ago. Nothing
has changed," observes Ted Nellen, an English teacher and staff
development coordinator at Alternative High Schools in New York
City. "But expectations certainly have."
A
smorgasbord
Convenient,
flexible, and cost-effective, online professional development
is helping teachers meet those changing expectations. Most teachers
turn to online training to learn about technology and how to integrate
it into the curriculum, but more and more are going online to
learn teaching strategies, earn graduate credit, or gain recertification.
Online professional
development has been particularly beneficial to those who are
isolated geographically or by subject area, says Stephanie Hirsh,
deputy executive director for the National Staff Development Council
(NSDC), in Oxford, Ohio. "High-quality online [training] with
other teachers around the country offers incredible support and
provides those who can't get to meetings a great opportunity."
Online training
comes in a variety of styles that fit personal and professional
needs, including video broadcasting, self-paced lessons, video
conferencing, and online learning communities.
 Glenn
Kleiman, project director for the Education Development Center's
Center for Online Professional Education and EdTech Leaders Online
program, uses online learning communities to train district leaders
who are responsible for professional development. The communities
usually feature a facilitator or expert who engages a group in
activities related to the group's subject area or grade level.
Members of the group perform classroom experiments and share effective
teaching strategies.
Kleiman says
he encourages teachers to think about classroom practice, integration
of technology, and addressing individual student needs and learning
styles.
"We find
the online meeting is very good," says Kleiman. "It provides time
and place flexibility and links up people who have reasons for
communicating but can't get together on a regular basis."
What's more,
he says, online professional development allows those who wouldn't
normally participate in a traditional workshop discussion to express
their thoughts.
"You get
people participating very actively in online workshops," says
Kleiman. "There's a whole different pacing. People can be more
reflective and thoughtful."
Nellen agrees.
"In online classes students dictate the pace," he says. "You get
to share ideas and see others' work. There's a lot more scholarship
going on."
The
online challenge
While many
teachers appreciate the benefits and conveniences of online learning,
it isn't for everyone. The experience can be challenging: The
technology isn't always flawless, and the participants don't always
have the computer skills to get the most out of an online course.
"It is always
hugely frustrating when the technology doesn't work right," says
Hirsh, who remembers several online courses she took in which
more than half of the participants dropped out because of technical
problems.
Another potential
problem, Hirsh says, is that online professional development may
contribute to the isolation of teachers and the fragmentation
of school improvement efforts if teachers are taking different
courses and learning different material. She sees the lack of
immediate feedback found in face-to-face traditional workshops
as another disadvantage of online courses.
So does Bob
McLaughlin, executive director at the National Institute for Community
Innovations (NICI), in Montpelier, Vt., which works in urban and
economically distressed areas to improve teacher education.
"I personally
believe that where you can bring people together face-to-face,
it's better to do that," says McLaughlin. "There are many circumstances
in which that's simply not possible, but it's still valuable to
bring them together."
Online professional
development is among the many services that NICI offers through
its Netcourses, custom-designed courses for teachers, future teachers,
and teacher education faculty.
"We don't
just want to provide online professional development," emphasizes
McLaughlin. "We try to meet the users' needs to make a difference
in their school."
But there
are just certain things only face-to-face training can offer,
says Cathie Runyan, an assistant at Staff Development for Educators
(SDE), a New Hampshire-based for-profit provider of professional
development workshops for K-12 teachers.
"People like
that personal contact," says Runyan. "They need to see the ideas
and want more visual stimulation than a computer offers." In addition,
she says, SDE workshops include materials that are "not anything
[teachers] can get online."
Who's
doing it
Just as there
is a variety of online courses, there also are many sources for
online training -- from regional education labs to universities
to for-profit companies.
Many states
and school districts look to professional development portals
(see sidebar on page 10) for online courses. But Nellen warns
educators to be cautious when purchasing online professional development
from for-profit companies.
"They're
there to make money," says Nellen, who formerly worked for one
such company. "They don't get meshed into the business of what
teachers are actually doing. They're very generic and have no
relevance to the classroom. It's like an outsider coming into
a school telling [teachers] how to do their job."
As a result,
some states have contracted with online companies to create customized
professional development programs, and some have drafted contracts
that hold online professional companies accountable for their
offerings. The Illinois State Board of Education, for example,
requires providers of online professional development to sign
a Statement of Assurances. The statement is a list of obligations
that the provider must meet, including a mechanism for monitoring
participation, a facilitator to guide participants, a course syllabus
along with activities, and documentation of completion.
The picture
is changing with the shakeout in the dot-com world, however. A
number of first-generation online companies have either merged
or closed, and new, more reliable ones have entered the field.
Some companies, Hirsh says, discovered that providing teachers
with online professional development wasn't the easy solution
they thought it would be.
"Many realized
that online professional development was not a panacea for meeting
teachers' needs and improving schools," she says. "More legitimate
companies have now entered into it."
Respected
education companies such as Britannica, Princeton Review, and
Scholastic all have gotten into the game, offering a variety of
online professional development opportunities for teachers.
The best
online programs, Hirsh says, are aligned with school or district
standards of learning. In Pennsylvania, for example, a number
of colleges and universities were awarded grants from the state
Department of Education in 1999 to develop Web sites, Internet-based
resources, and online classes for K-12 teachers. The program's
aim was to assist teachers in implementing Pennsylvania's academic
standards and prepare students for the state's assessment test.
Together, Penn State College of Medicine Center for Science and
Health Education and Penn State Harrisburg School of Behavioral
Sciences and Education developed a Web site that focused on professional
development for the state's science and technology standards.
And Dixon University collaborated with a number of education organizations
to establish Web-enabled professional development courses aligned
with Pennsylvania's mathematics curriculum.
Then there
are the districts that simply do it themselves, designing and
providing their own professional development curriculum. One such
district is the Memphis City Schools (MCS), which provides a combination
of traditional seminars and online courses to train the district's
7,000 teachers. The offerings range from classes in a group setting
at a Teaching and Learning Academy to self-paced instruction using
training modules. Most of the training modules focus on applications
teachers can use to integrate technology into instruction.
"Our students
were saying, 'We're tired of teaching our teachers how to use
our computers,'" says Bill Byles, staff development coordinator
for MCS. "The kids know a lot more than our teachers do."
Byles' award-winning
Internet4Classrooms
On-Line Practice Modules train teachers to use software such as
PowerPoint, Excel, and Dreamweaver and to design WebQuests.
And in Oregon,
teachers design staff development for their colleagues who teach
online high school courses for the Salem-Keizer Public Schools.
The focus is on strategies and best practices online teachers
can use in instruction. The online training provides the convenience
and flexibility needed to accommodate a variety of schedules,
says Jim Saffeels, who does program support for the virtual high
school SK Online.
"We've got
teachers scattered all over," says Saffeels. "Bringing them in
one spot at one time is very difficult, and doing it once a week
is impossible."
Mary Jean
Sandall, SK Online's principal, says online staff development
isn't significantly different from traditional training. "For
the learner to really merit something out of the training," she
says, "you want to have meaningful work in a meaningful setting."
But
does it work?
Online professional
development offers a number of advantages, including flexibility,
accessibility, convenience, and customization. But how can you
tell if it's actually working? How do you know if teachers are
really learning online? How do you know if they're taking what
they learn and using it in the classroom to improve student achievement?
There's no
evidence to date that online professional development has been
extremely effective or that it's better than traditional workshops,
says Hirsh of NSDC: "You don't know if it's changing [teachers']
practice, or if anything new or significant has happened for their
students." Some companies document teachers' "knowledge acquisition,"
she says, but "it's more challenging to access whether they have
skill acquisition. The vast majority haven't gone that far in
the process."
Before settling
on an online course, Hirsh advises, staff coordinators should
make sure the material adheres to accepted standards for professional
development (see sidebar on this page). She also suggests asking
questions about the course: Is there a mechanism for accountability?
Is there classroom-based support in case the equipment doesn't
work? Is the content research based? What are the credentials
of the course authors? Is it part of a bigger plan for professional
development?
 One
way to assess the effectiveness of an online course, says Nellen
of New York's Alternative High Schools, is to have teachers create
something, such as a project for students using technology, to
take back and use in the classroom. "Teachers are most concerned
with, 'How are we going to use this on Monday morning?'" he says.
McLaughlin
of NICI agrees. When teachers are engaged in the creative process
and are given activities designed to help with specific problems,
he says, they are more apt to get something out of an online course.
To assess the effectiveness of their courses, NICI online facilitators
also survey participants at the beginning, middle, and end of
each course. "We ask, 'How are we doing? What can we improve?
Are they making progress?'" he says.
But it's
not just online training that needs rigorous assessment, McLaughlin
says: "You have to have an environment where learners feel welcomed,
where they feel valued, and where they feel engaged. And we're
not doing that in online or traditional professional development."
Another
tool
Like other
opportunities made possible through technology, online professional
development is not the be-all and end-all; rather, it's one more
strategy to add to the training repertoire.
"Online learning
has particular strengths and functions, but it doesn't lend itself
to everything," says Kleiman of Education Development Center.
"It works best in hybrid models -- along with local study groups
or mentoring. It's not an answer to all professional development
but should be used as another tool."
But Kleiman
believes online training answers many needs in professional development
today. "We are introducing new standards, new technology; teachers
are facing more student diversity. The traditional model is not
effective," he says. "Any tools and techniques that meet the needs
of some teachers for professional development and are cost-effective
are very valuable."
In the end,
though, how staff development is delivered is less important than
how well it addresses teachers' needs. As McLaughlin puts it,
"Whether onsite or online, sustained professional development
keyed to educators' priorities is going to be the most effective
professional development."
Lottie
L. Joiner is assistant editor of Electronic School.
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