We’ve all been there: you leave a professional development workshop energized, inspired, and ready to make changes. But a few weeks later? That energy fades, and little has shifted. Why does so much of our well-intentioned, meaningful, and well-delivered professional learning often fail to make an impact? That’s exactly the issue Thomas Guskey pointed to in a recent article: despite good intentions, the outcomes of many professional learning efforts fall flat. He describes it as a puzzling mismatch between what schools invest and what actually changes in practice. Here’s the link to his article: https://kappanonline.org/explaining-the-puzzling-results-in-professional-learning-research/ A Puzzle With a Solution But maybe it’s not so puzzling after all. Most schools devote a huge majority of their time and money to the inputs of professional learning, deciding what conferences to attend, what speakers to bring in, or which online course to take. These decisions feel productive. They g...
Elevating Professional Learning: Dr. Molly Myers leads her faculty with an innovative twist on Professional Learning Communities (PLCs)
At Huddle Up Learning, we believe in the power of collaboration to enhance educational practices. One exemplary leader in this movement is Dr. Molly Myers, the Lower School Principal at Shanghai Community International School (SCIS), who has transformed the professional development landscape at her school. Watch the full podcast here (39:33) The Journey Begins: A Year of Growth 2023-24 "I want an organization that learns autonomously, period." Two years ago, Dr. Molly Myers initiated a structured approach to Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) within her faculty. To start the 2023-24 school year, different teams of faculty members chose their own PLC topics, focusing on improved instruction and identifying effective ways to measure student learning. Dr. Myers structured specific time set aside in the yearly calendar for teams to meet within their PLCs and share updates and feedback on the strategies they were implementing as well as the process itself. The culminatio...