A National Plan for Improving Professional Development

In this article from the National Staff Development Council, authors Dennis Sparks and Stephanie Hirsh put forward put forward national, and state, and local guidelines for improving teacher professional development. The authors assert that the changes they propose "will ultimately help redefine the role of teacher, cause a fundamental shift in how schools are organized, and create a cultural shift from teachers as industrial workers processing another load of children to teachers as professionals, using their specialized training to guide all children to higher levels of learning."

Paper