Act 48

Today we had a discussion at with some representatives at the state regarding Act 48. Concerns are being raised by the legislature regarding the efficacy of the current Act 48 system. The current Act 48 guidelines require programs of at least 3.5 hours and yet the PERMS system allows for uploading of single hour events. Administrators should anticipate that the Department will be updating the PERMS system and that participation in single hour or two hour events will be a thing of the past. In addition, anticipate that the Department will be conducting random audits to review Act 48 activities. These may be personal visits or phone calls. Items such as sign in sheets will likely be requested.

Recommendations:

  • According to the literature the purpose of professional development is to increase student achievement. Therefore, these changes could enhance the work already going on to support best practices.
  • I wouldn't panic about the changes. It will take time for the Department to change the system, work with providers to upgrade systems like CPETracker.
  • Look ahead to next year ----ensure your plan has programs, not single activities.
  • Consider building instructional coaching into your program as the follow up portion of the program.

Post Script: While the Act 48 Guidelines recommend programs of a minimum of 3.5 hours in length, they also clearly state that one shot professional development events are not appropriate and that programs , which include follow up activities should be planned.

Comments

Unknown said…
While I understand that hosting workshops with a minimum of 3.5 hours may cause our staff the need for reorganization of many current workshops, I am happy that the PERMS system may no longer allow for the upload of less hours.

When planning for this fall, questions arose regarding workshops of 2 hours in length were acceptable to submit to PDE via the PERMS system. Until additional information was received from PDE, this confusion greatly affected the planning of many of our workshops.

The current Act 48 guidelines state that 3.5 hours is recommended; however the guidelines do not currently read that 3.5 hours are required. I hope that the guidelines will be changed to reflect a required number of hours, no matter what that may be, as this will alleviate confusion for future planning and will allow our staff to adjust their workshops accordingly.
September 12, 2008 at 11:40 AM
kemeigh said…
We already know that effective professional development requires much more than a two hour workshop. If we continue to accept that as "professional development" we will never move our participants forward in their understanding and implementation of strong instruction, curriculum, and assessment.
Our professional development will look different, as will our classrooms. Again, we know more about the brain (adult brain too!) than ever before. So in order to provide respectful and useful workshops, we need to pay attention to this.
September 14, 2008 at 7:51 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Libraries as the Hub of School Improvement

Image
I love school improvement! It sounds geeky and surreal, but it’s true. I practically get goose bumps talking about continuous improvement and high leverage instructional strategies. We have worked hard at our IU to offer comprehensive services to support our school districts and truly thought we had most of the territory covered. However, turns out we never considered the role of school libraries as a source of school improvement. Summary of Research Concludes (Findings from 19 State and 1 Province including Pennsylvania) : “A substantial body of research since 1990 shows a positive relationship between school libraries and student achievement. The research studies show that school libraries can have a positive impact on student achievement—whether such achievement is measured in terms of reading scores, literacy, or learning more generally. A school library program that is adequately staffed, resourced, and funded can lead to higher student achievement regardless of the soc...
Read more

Planning for Differentiation

Image
An article in the Washington Post, Schools Look At Providing More Time For Teachers caught my eye recently which looks at teacher planning time. As you might imagine, teachers feel they lack planning time.... and they may have a point. The amount of planning time has stayed constant while requirements for inclusion and accountability have increased. My question is do we design curriculum to address these challenges from the onset or do we expect teachers to plan lessons, adjust their instruction for a variety of diverse learners, grade assignments, connect with parents and other colleagues, make copies in a 40 minute planning period? Why not differentiate the curriculum from the beginning? The graphic to the left depicts the Curriculum Planning Pyramid (Schumm, Vaughn, & Leavell, 1994) which represents how curriculum might be organized to meet the needs of all learners. The base represents the most important concepts you want ALL STUDENTS to learn. The middle layer represents...
Read more

Luau as a Metaphor for School Improvement

Image
The luau, once called the aha aina, was an event that was designed to unite the participants and foster good will, thanks and praise. The purpose of the luau could have been to celebrate accomplishments, honor heroes or gods, or commemorate important events. While some ancient foods represented strength or virility, other foods might symbolize virtues or goals the participants hoped to achieve (from To-Hawaii.com) A luau, in other words, is all about reflection. What is going well? What are the next steps? This is exactly what our school improvement teams did last week. They reflected on the level of implementation of their plan and the level of effectiveness. Participants spent the morning going through their plans goal by goal – looking back toward accomplishments and looking forward to next steps. We over-laid these discussions with information on managing and effectively facilitating change. We read Implications for School Leaders Facilitating Change , which is from H...
Read more