Development Plan Implementing the PLC Process - Report Example

Development Plan Implementing the PLC Process Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Development Plan Implementing the PLC Process Professional Development Plan That Implements the PLC Process Top Scorer Secondary School Introduction In any learning institution, the professional learning community is crucial for teachers to ensure that there is continuous growth in their skills. Therefore, an educational institution should be structured in a way that promotes the implementation of the PLC process to ensure that educators at the institution gain additional professional knowledge. About this, a development process which supports the implementation of the professional learning communities in learning environment becomes necessary. The following development process, therefore, discusses the development plan that school that implements the PLC process at Top Scorer High School located in Al-Murabba City at Riyadh region in Saudi Arabia. The development plan is created focusing on the dimensions of PLC practiced at Top Scorer High School plus the dimensions that need to be addressed at the institution while at the same time developing strategies to be implemented to about the PLC process. A) School Background The development plan that implements the PLC process has been created for the Top Scorer High School. The institution was established in the year 1998. In addition to this, the school is located at Al-Murabba City in Riyadh one of the regions in Saudi Arabia. The institution’s activities are financed by the government since it is a public school. Also, the institution has thirty-two teachers, both males, and females. Present at the institution is two hundred and one students who are all male. The Demographic and Cultural Context of the Institution The Top Scorer High School is a medium-sized facility with a population of two hundred and one students. The population is small compared to the size of the school, and therefore there is a possibility that the population of the institutions is expected to grow higher shortly. Therefore, Top Scorer High School population of the students has not reached the optimal number by having two hundred and one students. The school has a total number of thirty-two teachers, and the number is also expected to grow as the number of students grows in the future to satisfy the requirements of the ratio of students to teachers. The age of the students is between 15 and 18 years while that of the teachers is between 28 and 52 years. The institution is characterized by a positive culture where there exists positive attitude and the spirit of excelling is emphasized by the school. The culture of the community surrounding the school also has some association with the culture of the institution. B) PLC Practice at the Top Scorer High School Shared Values and Visions The Top Scorer High School is a learning institution that has been created on values and a vision which is shared by the stakeholders. Professional learning communities should be formed on values and a vision that is all shared between the shareholders of the institution (Collay, 1998). The primary objective of the institution is contained in the vision statement where it states that hard work leads to prosperity. Therefore, the prosperity that is being promised by the vision statement should be the one that is motivating the stakeholders in everything that they do as they share a common objective. The vision statement should be inspiring the professional community and should encourage them towards working to achieve it (Morrow, 2010). About this, the stakeholders of the learning community which is Top Scorer High School are being inspired by prosperity as a result of hard work and therefore making them work extra harder which will see them gain more professionally. Portraying the real image of an institution and what the institution is meant to be is what the stakeholders should always do. At Top Scorer Secondary School, the actual image of the institution is that of ensuring that the students excel in their studies and school shine in its performance. Teachers are working hard to ensure that the students excel in their studies. According to Hefner (2011), the vision statement should be used as a guiding tool to be used in making the decisions of an institution to achieve their primary objective. The shared vision of the institution has helped the teachers to make decisions about how they should teach to achieve the primary goal and portray the real image of the Top Scorer School. Collective Learning and Application The professional learning community encourages the collective seeking of new knowledge and ways to implement the knowledge. Professional learning community views collaboration as an essential component as regards to PLC’s (Mundry, Stiles & National Science Teachers Association, 2009; Hefner, 2011). According to Leonard & Leonard, (2003), collaboration is critical for a school as a professional learning community. At Top Scorer High School, stakeholders come together to make decisions about the performance of the school. The stakeholders, therefore, develop ideas on how the performance of the institution should be improved and ways to implement those strategies are discussed in the meeting. Therefore, recognizing the stakeholders and giving them equal opportunities to decide on the improvement of performance is an indication that the PLC dimension of collective learning and application is being practiced. Shared and Supportive Leadership Both the supportive leadership and the shared decision making are some attributes of the PLC process. The Top Scorer Secondary School is practicing this dimension of the PLC process. For instance, in the preparation of the institution's schedule which includes the plan for the activities of the institution, the institution is involved every stakeholder who is going to be affected by the program. By doing this, the school supports this dimension of the PLC process. Hipp & Huffman (2002) argue that there is a relationship between shared decision making and shared leadership since shared decision making encourages shared leadership. Therefore, about this, as Top Scorer High School, ensures that stakeholders participate in the schedule preparation plan, in the decision making process provide a chance for them to share leadership with those who might be delegated the authority to perform the process. An opportunity to be a leader is provided to the stakeholders and especially the teachers who at that time may only be involved in teaching. As a result, the skills of the stakeholders grow, and they learn how to become a professional leader as they continue to learn. Therefore, involving the stakeholders by the institutions ensures that the dimension of shared decision making and supportive leadership is practiced. Also, there is a good relationship that exists between the leaders of different departments with their juniors. For instance, there are various departments which some include, academic, environmental health and the dining department at the school where each department has a leader. There exists an excellent relationship between the heads of the respective departments. The existence of good rapport between these groups helps to increase the trust of seniors to their juniors where the delegation of duties is encouraged leading to the sharing of the leadership. According to Hord (1995), a good relationship existing between leaders encourages leadership sharing. Consequently, when power is delegated to teachers, they end up growing professionally since leadership skills are now imparted unto them. Proper communication with precise structures that support shared direction and decision making should exist in an institution to support the attributes of the PLC process. To ensure that the PLC process is supported, the structures should ensure that they encourage supportive leadership and decision making (DuFour, Eaker & DuFour, 2005). For example, at Top Scorer High School, structures which support leadership and shared decision making has been created where communication of what is expected of the juniors is clear to enable them to perform their duties and assist the seniors in making decisions. As a result, communication, and creation of proper structures to support the juniors in making decisions that ensure the provisions of the PLC process are given support. Consequently, as the juniors learn what to do to assist their seniors and as a result, they gain professional skills of leadership and decision making. Therefore, communication and the structures at Top Scorer High School will ensure the dimension of PLC, which includes supportive leadership and shared decision making is practiced at the institution. The Top Scorer School has provided workshops for the stakeholders to ensure that the institution encourages about learning ensuring that the stakeholders gain additional skills. Learning should be a continuous process as it ensures that the teachers gain additional skills to the teaching skills which enable them to become leaders and thereby support the provisions of the PLC dimensions of supportive leadership and shared decision making (DuFour & DuFour, 1990). By providing learning opportunities for teachers in the institution, the school is ensuring that there is supportive leadership by offering a chance to others who can gain the professional skills of leadership and become leaders too. After the learning process, the learners are then delegated with new duties and responsibilities in various leadership positions where they offer supportive leadership and assist in making decisions and therefore ensure the practice of the dimensions of the PLC. C) Dimensions of the PLC Process that Need to be Considered Shared Personal Practice Top Scorer as a professional learning community should be an institution where teachers should be encouraged to learn from their peers and gain additional skills that they do not have. However, at Top Scorer High School, teachers only do benchmark in other institutions, and this might not be helpful as the institutions do not have similar structures and the strengths of the other institution might not be so useful to the Top Scorer School. Therefore, there exists some weakness in the shared personal practice dimension of the PLC and therefore needs to be addressed. Huffman & Hipp (2003) argue that a professional institution as a professional learning community should encourage the shared personal practice between teachers to improve their skills. Therefore, the Top Scorer High School should address the dimension of shared personal practice where teachers should visit their fellow teachers while they are learning to enhance their teaching skills (Morrissey (2000). In addition to this, a teacher will have a chance of helping the other teachers improve their skills where they note that there is a weakness. Contrary to this, benchmarking which is being used by the Top Scorer Secondary School cannot help teachers learn their colleagues’ mistakes and offer support to them. Therefore, shared personal practice of the institution has a weakness that needs to be addressed. Supportive Conditions The supportive environment in which learning takes place is the one which houses the favorable conditions of a professional learning community. The supportive conditions of a professional learning community determine where, when and how the staffs at the institution come together to make decisions affecting the school. According to (DuFour, R., Eaker & DuFour, 2005), two types of supportive conditions exist within a PLC which include the collegial relationships and the structural conditions. The structural conditions include factors like communication procedures, staff development processes and time. Hord (1997) argues that in a PLC, there should be a proper time allocation of everything to ensure that learning and other issues get an appropriate allocation. At Top Scorer High School, time allocation is done in an uneven manner where major and lessons that are believed to be hard to tackle receive a more time allocation than the ones considered to be easier. Consequently, issues that are considered critical are becoming easier to address while on the other hand, the easier issues that receive little time allocation turn to be complex. Uneven time allocation is making some of the issues become a problem to the stakeholders and also creating internal conflicts between them and not improving their skills. Therefore, there exists a problem in time allocation and needs to be addressed. The collegial relationship is the relationship between stakeholders which includes increased trust, care and a positive attitude towards the individuals at the professional learning community. At the Top Scorer High School, lack of shared personal practice has contributed to the poor relationship that exists between the teachers. In addition to this, since the institution does not support the practical implementation of the shared personal practice dimension, a chance that could have been there to ensure that teachers interact with each other are lost. Also, the relationship between teachers will help them become innovative as they learn from others and provide instructions to their peers. A professional learning community should have structures that encourage innovation and creativity (Hord, 1997). Contrary to this, the school has put in place benchmarking which is not improving the collegial relationships within the institution and thus affecting the provision of an opportunity where teachers can show their creativity by supporting their fellow employees. D) Strategies to Develop Education Culture at the Top Scorer High School Communicating About Collaborative Works In this strategy, the school principal will communicate to the stakeholders on the importance of collaboration. One important thing about collaboration is that it helps the stakeholders learn from their colleagues as they develop ideas. Insisting on the collaboration ensures that decisions are made in a cooperative manner while at the same time views regarding the decision are brought about when the team is together. For instance, matters that require an input of the administrators ensure that can be discussed together with other stakeholders to give them a chance to learn about decision making and how leaders make decisions when it comes to critical matters of development. The strategy to be used in making clear focus of the collective works include communication of how the development process at the institution will be carried out. According to Robert & Pruitt (2009), collaboration helps teachers to learn from their fellow colleagues in the work environment. Therefore, the strategy will promote an educational culture at Top Scorer High School. Building Collegial Relationship and Sharing Vision The collegial relationship of the institution is weak and needs to be improved to promote an education culture in the organization where they can learn from one another. The strategy that can be used to improve the relationship between the teachers is communicating the importance of these collegial relationships and ensuring that the dimension of shared personal practices is being implemented at the institution. Increased interaction between the teachers ensures that teachers get used to each other and educate each other, thus helping them improve their professional skills. According to Graham & Ferriter (2010), an excellent relationship that exists between teachers helps them to learn from their colleagues thus improving their professional skills. Also, the institution should use the vision statement of the school as the uniting tool between the stakeholders and ensure that the primary goal of the institution is enshrined in the vision statement. Having good collegial relationships will help them gain professional skills as they get educated from each other and work towards the common goal. Developing Self-regulatory Skill The staffs at the Top Scorer High School should be made aware of what is expected of them at any time such that they can be able to assume any leadership at any time. In addition to this, the leaders will be in a position to make decisions on their own. The self-regulating strategy will, therefore, encourage the teachers to learn more since they can be told to assume any responsibility which should not be supervised. Self-regulatory skills help an individual to make decisions alone without relying on others, thus making one to be a leader by oneself (Kouzes, 2017). Consequently, self-regulatory skills will foster an educative culture while researching for information on how to make decisions by oneself. Insisting on Discipline Discipline determines the behavior of a person. The discipline of the stakeholders at Top Scorer School should be changed to ensure that they can stick to the policies of the institution which are developed to support the attributes that a professional learning community should have. The performance will always determine the performance of a learning institution. Discipline is one of the primary factors that determine the performance of the school (Gardner, 2014). Therefore, a good discipline within a learning community will ensure that the every policy that is brought about is followed to support the learning culture at the institution. Peer-to-Peer Review The former is a strategy of developing a learning culture in the institution where there is review of the work of the other teachers. As teachers review the work of their peers, they get to know where to copy their fellow teachers where they are strong at and offer them instruction support where they are destitute. According to Hord, Roy, Lieberman, Miller & Von (2014), professional learning community encourages the peer to peer review of the work of the colleagues as it helps in the improvement of the skills of the other workers. For instance, instead of benchmarking in other schools, Top Scorer High School, the benchmarking should be in the institutions and among fellow teachers. Consequently, this strategy will help create an educational culture within the institution and finally improve the professional skills of the teachers. E) Implementing the Supportive Conditions and Shared Personal Practice Phase of Change Strategies (Keep/Stop/ Start) Timeline Person Responsible How do you know if successful? Supportive Conditions (Structures, Relationships) Improve the supportive structures by ensuring there is proper time allocation for each activity Allowing teachers to participate in the development plans in order to consider each view from every stakeholder An after work meeting held for one hour after every three weeks in a school year. The school Principal Observing that an equilibrium between the allocation of time between the critical and non-critical issues have been attained. Shared Personal Practice Improving the teaching skills of the teachers Peer review of the work of the fellow teachers in order to learn from them and offer instructions to teachers Meeting for an hour after work every month during the school year The senior teacher sourcing the feedback if the teacher’s teaching method taking a new direction In brief, after the development plan is created, communication to all stakeholders about its provisions will be done to them in order to ensure it receives full support while implementing it. The development plan will be implemented in a period of three months where proper in order to have ample time to ensure that the stakeholders understand its provisions. An emphasis will be necessary where the dimensions of the PLC practice are weak. References Brown, J. F. (2016). The emotion regulation skills system for cognitively challenged clients: A DBT-informed approach. Collay, M. (1998). Learning circles: Creating conditions for professional development. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Corwin. DuFour, R., Eaker, R. E., & DuFour, R. B. (2005). On common ground: The power of professional learning communities. Bloomington, Ind: Solution Tree. DuFour, R., & DuFour, R. (1900). Learning by Doing: A Handbook for Professional Learning Communities at Work. Bloomington: Solution Tree Press. Gardner, M. M. (2014). Assessing student learning in the community and two-year college: Successful strategies and tools developed by practitioners in student and academic affairs. Graham, P., & Ferriter, W. (2010). Building a professional learning community at work: A guide to the first year. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press. Hefner, J. F. (2011). A case study of a professional learning community: An investigation of sustainability with a rural elementary school. Unpublished Doctoral dissertation, Appalachian State University, USA. Hipp, K., & Huffman, J. (2002). Documenting and examining practices in creative learning communities:Exemplars and non-exemplars. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED468685.pdf Hord, S. M., Roy, P., Lieberman, A., Miller, L., & Von, F. V. (2014). Reach the highest standard in professional learning. Hord, S. M. (1997). Professional learning communities: Communities of continuous inquiry and improvement. Austin, TX: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. Hord, S. (1995). Learning together, leading together: Changing schools through professional learningcommunities. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Huffman, J., & Hipp, K. (2003). Re-culturing schools as professional learning communities. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Education. Kouzes, J. M. (2017). Leadership Challenge: How to Make Extraordinary Things Happen in Organizations. Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, John. Leonard, L., & Leonard, P. (2003). The continuing trouble with collaboration: teachers talk. Current issues in education, 6(1), 1-9. Morrissey, M. (2000). Professional learning communities: An ongoing exploration. Austin, TX: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. Morrow, J. R. (2010). Teachers' perceptions of professional learning communities as opportunities for promoting professional growth. Unpublished Doctoral dissertation, Appalachian State University, USA. Mundry, S., Stiles, K. E., & National Science Teachers Association. (2009). Professional learning communities for science teaching: Lessons from research and practice. Arlington, Va: NSTA Press. Top of Form Roberts, S. M., & Pruitt, E. Z. (2009). Schools as professional learning communities: Collaborative activities and strategies for professional development. Thousand Oaks, C alif: Corwin Press. Bottom of Form Read More