Assigning Learning Value to Professional Development

Professional development provides a systematic process designed to increase the competencies needed by instructional and non-instructional personnel to perform their assigned duties and in the case of instructional personnel to improve the academic performance of students. The competencies addressed are knowledge, skills, aspirations, and behaviors. They are intended to enable personnel to perform their task with maximum effectiveness.

The competencies are new skill sets beyond the scope of assigned duties and responsibilities and are intended to realize performance improvements over time. For this reason, the completion of assigned duties or responsibilities and/or meetings where new information pertaining to a specific job is provided, do not qualify for Master Plan Points (MPP). Please refer to the attached chart which details the differences between information gathering and levels of new learning. Participants will not receive master plan points for any activity that is part of their assigned job task or activities pertaining to personal improvement not directly related to his/her job responsibilities, or informational meetings, etc.

Examples of activities that will not have a learning value assigned include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Administering/scoring tests for students or teachers
• Attending activities designed for personal improvement, e.g., tax preparation, financial management, stress management
• Attending meetings or informational sessions
• Chaperoning activities involving students
• Preparation of grants
• Evaluating textbooks
• Participating in an activity that does not incorporate all of the quality Professional Development Standards
• Record-keeping
• Serving as an in-service facilitator
• Serving on or attending bargaining agency meetings
• Serving on councils, committees, or advisory boards (SACS, Paper Reduction Committee, NTO Committee)
• Testing/screening of students
• Writing curriculum guides or materials

To ensure that programs are designed for high quality professional development, it is imperative to have guidelines for everyone to follow. All professional development conducted in the District or sponsored by a District office must conform to the National Staff Development Standards and the Florida Professional Development System Evaluation Protocol System. The District, Regional Center offices, and the schools work together to provide a continuum of high quality professional development and learning opportunities to all employees.

District and Regional Center offices focus on professional development with quality programs including content, pedagogy, and support structures; schools focus on Professional Learning Communities (PLC) which are collaborative school-based teams focused on student learning or teacher practice oriented on results, Action Research, Book Study, and School Improvement Initiatives. As a result, specific components will be identified for either school, Regional Center, or District office use. Together, professional growth will be focused and sustained to move the District towards reaching its goals.

School-based Compenents

The following school-based components and course proposal templates will be written by staff at the Center for Professional Learning and be available for schools to schedule sessions. Each of the school-based components will be worth up to 120 MPPs.

• School-based Professional Learning Communities
• Book Study
• Action Research
• School-based Improvement Initiatives
• School-based Technology
• School-based Curriculum Content
• School-based Instructional Support Strategies

Posting and Registering for PD

All professional development must be posted on the PD Menu & Registration System at least three weeks before the scheduled start date in order to provide employees with sufficient time to register prior to the commencement of the session or course.

It is critical that school-based PD is also posted on the PD Menu & Registration System with enough lead time for teachers and instructional personnel to register prior to the start of the activity. Teachers who do not pre-register for school-based PD will not be awarded master plan points for their participation. The school PD Liaison should advertise school-based PD through email, flyers, or notices posted where personnel sign in each day. However, it is the individual teacher's responsibility to register for PD.

District Policy on Walk-ins

Participants must pre-register for all professional development in order to be awarded master plan points for successfully completing all session/course requirements. For those participants on a wait list: Instructors will need to manually accept participants on the wait list for that course if space is available. Participants on a wait list will receive a status of notification to ensure pre-registration was finalized. Successful completion of a course/session includes: pre-registering for the course, attendance on all designated days and at the times posted, completion of all course assignments and follow-up, signing in on the official course/session roster for every meeting date, and completing the electronic evaluation ten days after being notified by email. All requirements must be adhered to in order to be awarded master plan points. Participants are not permitted to attend a session/course for which they have not previously registered for (walk-ins). There are no exceptions to this policy.

Course registrations generally close two hours before a session is scheduled to begin as long as there is space available. Once the session has reached maximum capacity it is closed. In the event that an individual arrives at a session for which he/she has not registered and the session is considered a district mandatory session (i.e., IPEGS, co-teaching, ESE/ESOL Compliance Training, etc.), the instructor may allow the individual to enter the session. However, the individual will not receive Master Plan Points unless the instructor sends an email to Mr. Carl Smith, Supervisor, PD Data Center at TonySmith@dadeschools.net by the close of the business day of the first session requesting manual registration for the individual. At the time of the request for manual registration, the following information must be provided: name and employee number of individual, course/session title, date and location. In addition, the individual's name and employee number must be manually added to the official roster by the instructor and the individual must sign-in as all other participants.

Master Plan Points for Recertification

Individuals planning on renewing their Professional Certificate at the end of June in any given year should plan on completing all professional development required for certificate renewal by the end of April of that year. There should be no expectation that any professional development attended in May or June will be closed out and master plan points awarded in time to meet certificate renewal deadlines. While staff in the PD Data Center constantly strives to accelerate processing time in terms of closing out courses and awarding master plan points, the volume of courses and the security procedures required to close out courses necessitates six to eight weeks to process. Therefore, it is the individual responsibility of instructional staff to monitor the number of master plan points that they have acquired over the five-year validity period, and to insure that courses/sessions are completed by April 30^th of their renewal year.