Strengthening Professional Development

By Dennis Sparks and Stephanie Hirsh

The evidence that good professional development can yield dramatic improvements in student learning grows with each new study. Because teachers cannot teach content they have not learned, nor use methods that are unknown to them, the nation needs to expand opportunities for teachers to develop new knowledge and skills necessary to ensure the highest levels of student learning. Both school districts and states must do more homework on the best ways to use professional development to gain the most achievement for the lowest expense.

The lack of high-quality professional development for teachers explains much of the failure of past school reforms. In the absence of substantial professional development, many teachers naturally gravitate to the methods they remember from their own years as students. Studies show only about half of teachers use new instructional strategies aligned with high standards and specifically developed to lead all students to achieve. States cannot improve schools through mandating high standards and tough tests unless they give teachers the tools, support, and training to help them change their practice.

A growing body of research supports this link between students' achievement and the quality of teaching. A Tennessee study by William Sanders, using 6 million test profiles, found that teacher effectiveness influenced student behavior more than any other factor. A Texas study of 900 districts found that teacher expertise explained 40 percent of the difference in student achievement and most of the performance gap between...