What does music, film, live performances, laughter, passion, reculturation and blogging for charity have in common?-- Western NY's Powerful Learning Practice's culminating celebration!

Holland's team performing a remake of "This Land is my Land" into a Web 2.0 Song

May 22, 2008- 20 school teams in the Western New York region came together to celebrate their learning journey that took place over the last 6 months through a job-embedded professional development opportunity called Powerful Learning Practice. Schools met as teams to master the following outcomes over the course of the year:

Knowledge: An understanding of the transformative potential of Web 2.0 tools in a global perspective and context and how those potentials can be realized in schools

Pedagogy: An understanding of the shifting learning literacies that the 21st Century demands and how those literacies inform teacher practice.

Connections: The development of sustained professional learning networks for team members to begin experimenting and sharing with other team members and online colleagues from around the world.

Sustainability: The creation of long term plans to move the vision forward in participating districts at the end of the program.

Capacity: An increase in the abilities and resources of individuals, teams and the community to manage change.

The culminating celebration is one of the two face-to-face meetings that take place in PLP. It is a time when the schools teams come together and share what they have learned with each other through learning displays, presentations, informal sharing in groups, and a facilitated process that results in bulleted action plans.

PRESENTATIONS

While all the schools teams had an opportunity to share their team projects and what they had learned from being involved in PLP this year, three projects were asked to share more fully from the stage. It was very difficult to decide who should present because most of the projects were just incredible. Those that presented were:

Webster Teams,
Holland Team, and Niagara Academy. But the presentation that stole the show was given by Laura, the 5th grader who authors the blog: Twenty Five Days to Make a Difference.

Will writes about her presentation,

She talked about how she started her quest to get donations for
charities by finding sponsors for her daily good works, how surprised
she is that over 30,000 people have visited her blog since last
December, and how she’s been able to donate over $1,600, 50 pairs of
pajamas, and over 400 books to charities in her area. It’s a great
story and example, one that I’ve shared with Tess on a number of
occasions."

Another PLP participant Mike Maloy adds,

I’ve written on the group’s Ning and in comments on various
blogs about how my learning has been completely transformed. I’ve
written on my own blog about how inspiring and “human” the web can be.
I’ve been awed by Jill Bolte’s “My Stroke of Insight” and Randy
Pausch’s “Last Lecture”.

I can honestly say that Laura’s presentation was one of the
coolest, most enlightening experiences of all my years in education.
Since her presentation I’ve been wondering…If Laura can do what she is
doing as a fifth grader, what will she be able to do in the future? If
Laura can do what she is doing as a fifth grader, why the heck can’t I
be doing more? Will my daughter be inspired do something so special.

I was also incredibly impressed with the creativity in Western NY. For example, Holland's team opened with a Web 2.0 remake of This Land is My Land and closed with Eric Lawton singing an original song he wrote entitled, You've Got to Learn Web 2 Point Oh. You can listen to 2 minutes of that here--> Download youve_got_to_learn_web_2_point_oh.mp3

What a hoot! Not to be outdone Holland's superintendent followed in "American Idol" style with a song he sang A cappella to Will and I. All in all it was as touching as it was entertaining.

Reflecting on how PLP has impacted participants

When asked how has PLP impacted or changed your professional or personal practice those who attended the WNY celebration give many reasons. Here are a few of their responses.

• The resources shared and the connections with the community...I have started to build my network outside of my building.
• Broadened exposure to web 2.0 tools beyond personal use.
• Facilitated collaboration with colleagues within my district (but outside my building) that was little-to-none prior to this.
• It gathered all of the teachers using tech
  together to work on one common goal. Otherwise, we would have just kept working
  independently on our own path. It really pushed our district to start a plan to
  implement and educate others in our district.
• It gave importance to technology and gave those
  of us with a passion and knowledge around technology a voice with our schools.
• Working with other members from my district that
  I usually don't get to see. Their ideas and perspectives during this learning
  process were greatly valued.
• I am no longer embarrassed about what I don't
  know and I am excited about learning and moving forward.
• I am using tools I didn't even know existed
  before this year. I modeled in a regular meeting and taught other staff through
  the process enough for them to say they will go back and use it in their
  classrooms. I want to learn more and use it to help teachers in the district
  support one another to excellence.
• The level of support that is available in this
  network is comforting. There is a lot of knowledge among the PLP community.
• Thanks for the opportunity. It has been an
  excellent, life changing learning experience. I hope we can sustain and spread
  our learning. If I can inspire one other person like I have been I would
  consider it a great accomplishment
• You've opend my eyes to the potential of 2.0 and
  have created a more technologically literate individual! I felt both Sheryl and
  Will's support was awesome very encouraging and empathetic.

  Kickoff Meeting

Culminating Meeting

There is a price to be paid for community driven learning- TIME. There are only so many hours in a day to invest in reading, learning, writing, and all that goes with being part of a community of learners. The benefits far outweigh the cost, so I am not complaining, however, it is beginning to impact the time I had previously devoted to blogging.

I was reading a post on Our Virtual Class Blog called 2.0 Riptide. He quotes Konrad Glogowski who after finishing his dissertation establishes research questions that  he hopes to be able to
work on in the near future:

1. How do we prepare teachers to teach 21st century learners whose
   lives are based on rich interactions in multiple online environments?
2. How do we help new teachers move away from what Marshall McLuhan
   once called the “imposing of stencils” and adopt a practice of probing
   and exploration?
3. How do we help new teachers acquire the courage to transform their
   classrooms into communities of learners and transform themselves into
   participants who can embed themselves in those communities?

These questions are near and dear to my heart because they are the very questions I have found myself grappling with for the last four years. As I have shared before, years of experience working in several large projects that look directly at these very  issues (ENDAPT, TLN, ABPC 21st Century Learners, ASSETOnline and now Powerful Learning Practice) it seems I keep coming full circle to networking, community of practice, true collaboration and what my friend John Norton terms "mutual accountability" among teachers.

MUTUAL ACCOUNTABILITY
John asked recently on TLN, "What's the difference between "negative competitiveness" and a willingness to trade narrow accountability measures from the outside for collaborative accountability -- where teachers hold one another accountable for teaching quality? He suggests that until teachers seize that ground, they will always be on the defensive and easy targets for top-down reform.

One teacher's response caught my attention-

Teachers need to be seen as professional leaders in their districts and
communities, leaders able to work together to improve student learning...  Teachers are either working as silos, not
interested in collaboration, or scared to show their areas of
vulnerability for fear of ridicule or reprisal.

To "[seize] that ground", convincing administrators, public opinion,
media, etc. that collaborative accountability is the best method for
improvement, I believe we must expand our playing field.  We need to
seize the grounds of media and public opinion regarding education,
testing, school and community partnerships, and the nature of
improvement and change.  This requires organization.  Where is the
teacher voice?

Then it hit me, this is exactly where participatory media can make its biggest impact. Allowing teachers to network together online first - forming personal learning networks around areas of passion and interest and gaining comfort and trust in the nonthreatening use of the medium helps to give teachers the confidence they need to use these tools to hold each other accountable for learning.  Using tools like Twitter, Tapped In, NING, Blogs, wikis, Ustream, Diigo, Elluminate, etc, teachers who understand how to "seize the ground" can apprentice teachers who are emergent in their understanding of such concepts. Conversing and working at it together in spaces that are somewhat separate from the local context, educators can learn within the safety net of the community and develop the self-efficacy skills and boldness needed to generalize what they are learning to their local context.

WHY IS IT EASIER TO COLLABORATE TOGETHER ONLINE THAN IN OUR SCHOOLS?
One of my consulting projects this year has been for CTQ's ASSETOnline project. I have had the wonderful experience of working with Anne Jolly, a professional learning community expert. In a recent conversation online she asked teachers if they liked collaboration and if not, why not. In her true researcher form she compiled the results.

Frustrations that lead to a preference for working
alone in some cases.
These include . . .

1.  Not knowing what collaboration really means
2.  Not knowing what is actually expected from those collaborating
3.  Insufficient implementation support
4.  Not finding real value in collaboration
5.  Different teaching philosophies among participants/ little to share
6.  Doesn't spring from teacher's needs
7.  Dictates and limits from administrators about content for collaborative meetings
8.  Teachers left out of decision-making
9.  Lack of modeling/understanding of collaboration by administrators
10. Need space to be creative - tricky to do this in teams
11. Lack of training for collaboration
12. Lack of trust and comfort in sharing with other teachers - feeling threatened
13.  Not enough time
14.  Getting everyone on the team on the same page is hard
15.  "I don't like meetings!"  :-) - a waste of time that could be spent grading and preparing
16.  Need more time for self-reflection rather than group reflection
17.  Others on the team pass off other's work as their own
18.  Too much talk and not enough action
19.  Not enough clout - except in the classroom
20.  One person does all the work
21.  Merit pay breeds competitiveness rather than sharing
22.  The education system is designed for isolation - and the status quo is strong
23.  The atmosphere can be punitive
24.  The school setting doesn't support collaboration
25.  Teachers are overwhelmed and trying to survive difficult situations
26.  Lack of communication about changes and the reason for changes

Feeling that collaboration works at times too, such as when  . . .
1.  Teachers see value in the collaboration
2.  Teachers have similar teaching philosophies and complementary skills
3.  Collaboration is more natural and spontaneous than structured
4.  Collaboration springs from teachers' needs
5.  Collaboration is not mandated
6.  Teachers make decisions about what they collaborate on
7.  Administrators practice what they preach
8.  The atmosphere is trusting, respectful, and comforting
9.  The school is successful at supporting collaboration
10. Teachers have time to think through together what they want for their kids
11. There is time for introspection as well as collaboration

I am curious-
How do you feel about collaboration?  Do you feel safe enough in your school to "sieze the ground" or do you hesitate to share for fear of ridicule or reprisal. Do you feel collaboration online is easier than it is locally in your own schools or organizations? Or do you feel the same hesitancy to publish and as a result become "clickable?" Do walled gardens (private online communities of practice)  make you feel safer in terms of being transparent enough to hold each other accountable for what kids are learning in our schools?

I have been reflecting this morning on how Communities of Practice operate as powerful vehicle's or venues for change both in and out of education.

Communal Living and Community
My first experiences happened as a young woman living on The Farm, the largest successful commune in America. It was there that I first began to see the power of relationships in enabling others toward positive change. How identity is formed through meaningful social interactions and conversations around practice and reform.

"Utopian thought, as the basis of communal ideology, idealizes social
unity and maintains that humanness exists only in intimate and
collective life" (Kanter, 1972, p.32). While on the Farm, my thoughts on justice, sincerity,
honesty, and humanity really started to take shape.The foundation was laid to rethink the status
quo, respectfully question authority, and always stand up against unjust acts towards marginalized populations. The desire to become a voice for the voiceless was birthed.

Christian Community
In my late twenties, I discovered the loving community that comes from belonging to a group of people who are held accountable to one another in relationship under a set of established spiritual beliefs. I came to learn and grow so much as a mother, daughter, and individual through the vertical and horizontal relationships  I developed overtime as a Christian. The molding and shaping of my character and personality through the exercise of being held collectively to a higher standard gave me the tools needed to be self-governed and disciplined. The unconditional love and friendship I received as part of the Christian community, nurtured me through the negative effects of my childhood and the untimely death of my spouse when my daughters were just one and two. The relationships I formed taught me through a social learning process how to be a good mother and a woman of integrity. I am still growing into  someone who tries very hard to embraced personal excellence, always holding myself to this high standard, but yet allowing others to have the grace to choose the path and way they deem best for them.

Virtual Community
In my mid-thirties I got my first computer. I was running a small, innovative K-12 school at the time called Friendship Bridge, as well as teaching preservice teachers at Valdosta State University as an adjunct. Immediately, I discovered bulletin boards and IRC chat and began to establish a network of content experts and friends from around the world who became my personal learning network. We would connect at various times throughout our day sharing what we were learning. There was a solider in Germany who  taught me about networking and hardware, a father and hockey enthusiast in Canada who joined me in experimenting and pushing the new tools to the limit, a brilliant young man in his 20s that was living in Florida who was trapped somewhat by his circumstance and spent his boredom at the public library, sequentially reading every book on the shelf and then sharing with me each author's ideas, and and countless others who each left their mark upon my life- some for my good and some - well, not so good. But it was community and we were all left changed by the ideas of the other.

It reminds me of Tennyson's poem Ulysses:

I am part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough
Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
As though to breath were life. Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this grey spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

I continue to be molded and shaped by the relationships I form around the world.

Community of Practice
When I came to Virginia in 1997, I tried to escape education. I worked for awhile as a MCSE trainer helping various network engineers get their industry certifications. I was struck by how competitive the field was and how little community existed. While the money was incredible, I missed children, teachers, and the potential for positive change (both individual and systemic) that I felt as part of that environment. So I took a position with a high needs (many homeless children) elementary school as a computer resource teacher in hopes to give back for all I had been given.

What I observed in terms of community at that small school was what Richard Elmore (2002) describes as a buffer- a protective barrier that discourages and even punishes close,
constructive scrutiny of instruction and the supervision of
instruction. Its primary effect is to protect these two—the heart of
schooling—“from outside inspection, interference, or disruption” (p. 6).

The buffer prevents true communities of practice from developing and from teachers and educational leaders being able to learn more about what is working within the classroom. It prevents teachers from knowing what or how
well they or their colleagues (both local and global) teach. It deprives us all of any meaningful
frame of reference and discourages us from learning from each other.

I remember my mentor Greg Anderson, who served as the principal of my school, warning me that I was using technology as a rebel would - that schools were
based on equity, even if that equity meant schools didn't change to
give kids what they needed, what was good for one school, culturally becomes the
status quo for all schools. Greg, in spirit, supported my change efforts (when
he felt they were in the best interest of children) he just didn't want
a "loose cannon" causing him to lose his job in the process.

I  pushed the teachers at my school to see technology as a communication and collaboration tool. As a way to connect with others and remove the barriers of isolation the four walls of the classroom created. I wanted technology to provide transparency, the same transparency I had experienced on the Farm and in my small school and in the Christian community- between teachers within the local school and beyond.

Judith Little (1993) has often talked about the private, protected world of
teaching:

In large numbers of schools,
and for long periods of time, teachers are colleagues in name only. They work
out of sight and hearing of one another, plan and prepare their lessons and
materials alone, and struggle on their own to solve most of their
instructional, curricular, and management problems.

She and others see this approach of non-interference,
privacy, and harmony as part of the problem in that it prevents us from getting to the root of what needs to change in schools. This culture of privacy and non-interference is fertile soil for maintaining status quo. However, she goes on to say,

Against this almost uniform
backdrop of isolated work, some schools stand out for the professional
relationship they foster among teachers. These schools, more than others, are
organized to permit the sort of reflection…that has been largely absent from
professional preparation and professional work in schools. For teachers in such
schools, work involves colleagueship of a more substantial sort. Recognition
and satisfaction stem not only from being a masterful teacher, but also from
being a member of a masterful group.

It was this kind of community, this kind of meaningful dialog I so fervently wanted to see happen. I wanted to break through the buffer so that collectively teachers could see the status quo for what it was and through the collective wisdom and strong relationships within the community, make a courageous commitment to challenge and change the status quo.

Teacher Leadership and Community

The first opportunity I had for this to happen was within the Teacher Leaders Network (TLN). Terry Dozier, for whom I was leading the Virginia Teacher Leader Forum, sent me in her stead to a steering committee meeting for the development of a national virtual community of practice for teacher leaders across the country. The Center for Teaching quality had gotten the recommendations for 100 top educators who were not only highly accomplished but were articulate and positioned locally as changed agents. What was birthed out of that meeting was TLN and under the loving leadership of John Norton has grown to become one of the most visible groups of teachers impacting educational policy in the nation. It is through TLN that I am personally shaped and challenged daily. This is my community of practice.

Bielaczyc & Collins (1999) describe a community of practice as:

The defining quality of a learning
community is that there is a culture of learning, in which everyone is involved
in a collective effort of understanding. There are four characteristics that
such a culture must have: (1) diversity of expertise among its members, who are
valued for their contributions and given support to develop, (2) a shared
objective of continually advancing the collective knowledge and skills, (3) an
emphasis on learning and how to learn, and (4) mechanisms for sharing what is
learned. If a learning community is presented with a problem, then the learning
community can bring its collective knowledge to bear on the problem. It is not
necessary that each member assimilate everything the community knows, but each
should know who within the community has relevant expertise to address any
problem.

This is a radical departure from the traditional view of schooling,
with its emphasis on individual knowledge and performance, and the expectation
that students/teachers will acquire the same body of knowledge at the same time. Yet this is the model that not only provides systemic change, but holds the potential for a change inititative to push beyond the incremental culture of change expected in schools  to one of exponential reform that produces results now- so that our kids get what they need now, not after they graduate or in spite of the status quo from their own efforts.

21st Century Community

Through John Norton, I met Cathy Gassenheimer of the Alabama Best Practice Center.  Together we wrote a proposal that was funded by Microsoft that took the best of all of our experiences around using community as a vehicle of change and created a 21st Century teaching and learning collaborative that used Web 2.0 tools to connect 40 school teams across the state in exploration and understanding of using personal networking literacies to change their practice.  We are currently in the third year of the project and teachers this year are focusing on the needed changes in pedagogy that relate to the current shifts and new tools. Working with student teams and other stakeholders the outcome of all our community is learning is being seen virally in the spread throughout schools and across the state. Most recently, the state of Alabama has been in conversations with the Partnership of 21st Century Skills to become a partnership state.

Building Community Online

Communities of practice are clusters of people who share a concern or passion for something they do and as they interact regularly, they improve (Wenger, 1998). A driving force behind a community of practice is community knowledge, in which the sum of the collective knowledge is greater the sum of the individual knowledge (Gherardi & Nicolini, 2002) therefore as the collective knowledge grows stronger, so does the individual's knowledge (Bielaczyc & Collins, 1999). They operate on the premise, "None of us
is as good as all of us." Wenger (2004) also suggests that by focusing on the system or the group as a whole, does not imply that the individual should be ignored.

Hall and Hord (1987) emphasized, organizations do not change - individuals do. However, it is through the relationships that learning occurs.
McDermott (in Murphy 1999, p.17) describes it this way:

Learning traditionally gets measured on the assumption that it is a possession of individuals that can be
found inside their heads…[Here] learning is in the relationships between
people. Learning is the conditions that bring people together and organize a
point of contact that allows for particular pieces of information to take on
relevance; without the points of contact, without the system of relevancies,
there is not learning, and there is little memory. Learning does not belong to
the individual persons, but to the various conversations of which they are a
part.

According to Wenger (1998) not all communities are communities of practice. Three
characteristics must be in place: 1) a common commitment to the same sphere of
influence (you couldn’t be in someone's community and not know it 2) community-
members are engaged in activity and discussions; they help one another, and
share information. 3) active practice- members are not just united by interests
but by practice.

So how does community for in online? Are the relationships forged in the blogosphere and other social networking sites like Twitter, Delicious, Flickr, NING, Tapped In, and others ways to build true community? Or are they networking or as some suggest a new learning theory all together called connectivism?

According to George Seimens, the principles of connectivism are:

• Learning and knowledge rests in diversity of opinions.
• Learning is a process of connecting specialized nodes or information
     sources.
• Learning may reside in non-human appliances.
• Capacity to know more is more critical than what is currently known
• Nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning.
• Ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is
           a core skill.
• Currency (accurate, up-to-date knowledge) is the intent of all connectivist learning activities.
• Decision-making is itself a learning process. Choosing what to learn and the meaning of incoming information is seen through the lens of a shifting reality. While there is a right answer now, it may be wrong tomorrow due to alterations in the information climate affecting the
  decision.

Virtual Learning Communities

Emerging technologies such as social networking and other Web-based tools have the potential to offer opportunities for new
kinds of communities of practice for teachers and students. These tools bring
enormous leverage to teachers at relatively little cost — intellectual
leverage, social leverage, media leverage. Virtual learning communities use
technology to established connections across barriers of time and space
(Johnson, 2001). Teachers can participate in discussions at their convenience-
anytime, anyplace.

A burgeoning body of opinion and research
suggests that virtual learning communities are becoming the venue through which
agents for change operate (Palloff & Pratt, 1999: Johnson, 2001; Barab
& Duffy, 1998; Dede, 2003). The potential is enormous, as knowledge capital
is collected and the community becomes a sort of an online brain trust,
representing a highly varied accumulation of expertise.
According to Dede (2003) the
most important challenge for educational leaders today is fostering 21^st
Century skills and knowledge in today's students so they will be prepared to
participate in our global economy. This challenge requires that teachers
understand what types of knowledge and skills are required in leading edge
workplaces and future careers. Teachers will also need to become adept at
higher order cognitive, affective, and social skills such as systems thinking,
creativity, and collaboration. This will require transformational strategies
for developing deeper core content, new models of pedagogy, and development of
personal learning networks (Dede, 1998).

Virtual learning communities are one
way to provide the intellectual, emotional, and social support needed for
teachers to unlearn and relearn contextually in an effort to bring about the
needed behavior changes necessary to make way for the next generation of
classroom practices (Dede, 1999).

Personal Learning Practice

Most  recently, my thoughts around community are playing out in the work I am doing  with Will Richardson through our new LLC Powerful Learning Practice. Both Will and I believe that a teacher needs personal experience with the new literacies, using them to learn about their own passionate interests before applying them to the classroom. The reason many 21st Century teaching and learning projects have failed to make significant changes in school culture is directly related to both the buffer concept mentioned above and a lack of ownership and nurturing teachers need for these strategies to become pedagogically sound.  Learning, applying, and deepening understanding of the shifts in the changing learning landscape and how to use the new Web tools to break through the buffers of isolation occurs best in communities of practice. 

It is with great excitement that I look to 2008 to see how my understanding of community will grow and the new directions I will take in my own personal learning and the relationships I will develop along the way.

In this day and age of school reform, many are looking to how we train teachers as the key to educational improvement. Research shows that on average school districts spend the equivalent of $200 per pupil on professional development and these learning experiences add both time and effort demands on a teachers already impossible day (Killeen, 2002).

The federal No Child Left Behind Act’s emphasis on results has prompted school system leaders, staff developers, principals, and
teachers to become much more deliberate about the professional-development choices they make.

While our profession more than ever needs to build capacity in its teachers, we also need to be sure that time, energy, and resources are used only on "quality programs that teach with and about best practice" (Dede, 2006, p.1).

The World is Changing
Today, new and emerging Web technologies are connecting our children in ways never before possible. Through blogs, social networking sites, multimedia and other “Web 2.0” tools, their worlds are becoming more and more networked and engaging, creating environments for learning and collaborating
that look little like our traditional classroom spaces.

Schools, Not So Much
Conversely, schools have by and large been resistant to these shifts. Teachers complain, maybe rightly so, that they simply do not have the time to master the needed strategies. Attempts to gain the knowledge needed through workshops are often fragmented and unable to provide the ongoing daily guidance needed as teachers attempt to implement needed change in practice.

The Role of Community to Bring about School Reform
However, the development of professional learning communities (PLCs) across schools districts is one solution experience has shown me really works. Using a combination of face to face, synchronous and asynchronous meetings in a variety of settings (school-based, state-wide, and global) professional learning teams can participate in professional development that is tailored to teachers' busy schedules, while drawing on the valuable resources/experts not available locally, and that provides work-embedded support.

My Contribution to Educational Reform
Using the experience I garnered from the pilot I helped to develop and lead in Alabama, Will Richardson and I have recently teamed together to connect small teams of educators from around the globe in 21st Century learning environments. Our approach is different than the work in Alabama, but the intended outcomes are the same- bring education into the 21st Century.

Will and I are also working with administrators within the participating schools and districts in the development of systemic plans that lay the groundwork for a three and five-year vision for principled change. Our Powerful Learning Practice (PLP) project is currently helping educators to experience the transformative potential of social Web tools to build global learning communities and re-envision their own personal learning practice.

Outcome-Making the World a Better Place
The opportunities for learning thus far have been incredible. But the one that simply rocked my world is a project that one of the teacher leaders involved with our work helped her daughter create.

Laura, a ten-year old girl in upstate New York started a blog Twenty Five Days to Make a Difference
that in just a week’s time has caught the interest of a whole bunch of
kids from around the world (media too) who want to make a difference as well. Talk about transformative! Laura offers a classroom challenge- as teachers you will want to check it out and get your class involved and there is an opportunity to match funds for the winning "Make a Difference" project too!

Laura on Day 1 of her 25 Days to Make a Difference Project

References

Killeen, K. (2002). School district spending on professional development: Insights available from national data. Journal of Educational Finance. 28 (1) pp 25-49.

Dede, C. (2006). Online professional development for teachers: Emerging models and methods. Cambridge, Massachusetts:Harvard Education Press