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Large TX District Takes Theory into Practice

Case StudySchool Improvement Network

GARLAND INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT, TX

With over 57,000 students and 74 campuses, the Garland Independent School District (GISD) is the second largest district in Dallas County and one of the largest districts in the state of Texas. The community maintains a “small town” feeling, yet teachers have access to the increased resources that large districts can offer. In 2009, the school district was rated “academically acceptable” by the Texas Education Agency.

In the spring of 2006, GISD underwent a curriculum audit that included an analysis of the district’s professional devel-opment (PD) program. The audit report recommended that Garland needed to look for ways to differentiate PD in order to meet every teacher’s needs with relevant materials.

“We knew we needed to address the ‘one-size doesn’t fit all’ feedback we received from our teachers. As district leaders, we wanted to provide other options besides large group training sessions, which limited our ability to differentiate.” Dr. Butch Sloan Executive Director of School Improvement Garland ISD, TX

As Dr. Sloan and his colleagues discussed how to amelio-rate this issue, GISD began implementing classroom walk-throughs, during which principals were supposed to look for the nine high-yield Classroom Instruction That Works strate-

gies. Principals quickly realized that most teachers did not thoroughly understand the strategies and were definitely not comfortable using them. The district began a major push at the beginning of the 2007 school year, purchasing a Classroom Instruction That Works book for every teacher and hiring an expert speaker.

“After heavily promoting the nine strategies, our teachers understood the strategies theoretically but were still hesitant to actually use them in the classroom. We thought it would be helpful for teachers to see videos of other teachers implementing the strategies.” Dr. Butch Sloan Executive Director of School Improvement Garland ISD, TX

Garland ISD purchased several Classroom Instruction That Works DVD programs from School Improvement Network. Although the content was what they needed, they quickly realized it would be difficult to make the DVDs available to every teacher in the district.

Following their purchase of the DVD programs, GISD was in-troduced to PD 360, School Improvement Network’s online, on-demand professional learning resource. Not only does PD 360 include the content from the Classroom Instruc-tion That Works DVD, it contains an additional 1500 video segments on a wide variety of topics, each of which include real classroom examples of teachers implementing best

DISTRICT PROFILE

DISTRICT FOCUSSOLUTION

CHALLENGES

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practices. PD 360’s on-demand delivery system enabled Garland to scale professional learning at the district-level, allowing them to reach every teacher in every location.

“When we found PD 360, we felt it would allow us to address our concerns around differentiating professional learning and move our current staff development to a whole new level. We felt that it would be a very valuable tool to add to our professional development program.” Dr. Butch Sloan Executive Director of School Improvement Garland ISD, TX

PD 360 is an on-demand library of professional teacher development resources that leverages technology to make professional learning more effective, convenient, and sustainable. With over 200 hours of research-based video content, plus tools for follow-up, tracking, reflection, and group training, PD 360 is the most comprehensive solution to professional teacher development needs.

More than 700,000 educators across North America already use PD 360 to access individualized support on the most relevant topics, like differentiation, minority student achieve-ment, English language learners, classroom instruction that works, leadership, assessment, and many more. PD 360’s content is divided into hundreds of indexed and searchable segments that make it easy for teachers, administrators, aspiring leaders, coaches, mentors, paraprofessionals, and professional learning communities to find the answers they need. New content is continually added to keep educators up to date. See a demonstration at www.pd360.com.

• GISD began implementing PD 360 in the spring of 2008 by training over 200 principals and central office staff.

• Before the 2008-2009 school year began, GISD rolled out PD 360 for its nearly 4,000 teachers.

• Central office staff and principals supported implemen-tation at the campus level by presenting PD 360 to teachers and training them on how to use it.

GISD conducted an online PD survey, which included two specific items about PD 360, in January 2009 with almost 800 elementary and almost 1,000 secondary staff responding. The survey found that:

• Over 90% elementary and over 80% secondary staff described their initial reaction to PD 360 as very posi-tive after the August training.

• Over 80% of all levels of teachers indicated that they had viewed PD videos using PD 360 while over 50% use PD 360 on a regular basis.

• As of March 31, 2009, GISD had 4,591 registered PD 360 users who have documented 525,798 viewing minutes (an average of 114 minutes per user).

Garland ISD has experienced many benefits from PD 360.

One of the challenges GISD has faced is helping teachers move beyond theory to actual classroom practice. A vari-ety of real classrooms from across the country is shown in every PD 360 program so that teachers can actually see how to implement best practices in their own classroom teaching.

With PD 360, GISD can meet its teachers’ needs for more differentiated and relevant professional learning. A differ-entiated approach to PD is needed to meet the diversity of teacher needs. PD should be an evolving process of reflec-tion and growth that is sustained in communities of practice and focused on job-embedded responsibilities.

“Our teachers were asking for more modeling and explanation than we were currently providing using traditional staff development environments. With PD 360, our professional development is much more flexible. We can now meet a wide variety of needs with one resource.” Dr. Butch Sloan Executive Director of School Improvement Garland ISD, TX

In addition to supporting GISD’s focus on the nine high-yield strategies, PD 360 includes many other programs on all the most relevant educational topics. The four programs focused on teaching English Language Learners (ELL) will be particularly helpful to Garland with its high population of ELL students. Separate elementary and secondary exam-ples make learning relevant to teachers at every school in the district.

With 1,500 fully indexed video learning segments, GISD educators instantly find the help they need in the most pertinent topics. In addition, content is continually being added with even more programs that are up to date and applicable.

DRIVING USAGE AND IMPLEMENTATION

Real Classroom Examples

BENEFITS

ABOUT PD 360

Differentiated Learning for Every Teacher

Large Library of Content

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PD 360’s integrated tracking and reporting has been very well received by principals who are now able to document what training teachers have completed. In addition, the follow-up and reflection tools encourage teachers to do what they are supposed to do and ensure higher levels of implementation.

Because teachers are experiencing more focused PD, GISD students are benefitting with test scores that have been steadily rising since 2007.

Garland ISD Proficiency Percentages2007 2008 2009 2010

Math 78% 83% 85% 86%Reading 90% 91% 91% 93%

Because it meets the varied needs of each teacher with differentiated learning, administrators and teachers agree that PD 360 is a vital component of GISD professional development.

“All of our campus administrators and all of the program coordinators responsible for staff development have integrated PD 360 as an important staff development resource for the 2009-2010 school year. We are excited about the plans to offer ‘online courses’ within PD 360 and plan to develop some specific courses for our district.” Dr. Butch Sloan Executive Director of School Improvement Garland ISD, TX

School Improvement Network is the leading provider of teacher education and teacher training, specializing in on-demand, research-based professional development anytime, anywhere. As the home of The Video Journal of Education, PD 360, Observation 360, and the Learning 360 Framework, School Improvement Network’s education training resources focus on the most relevant topics, such as classroom management, minority student achievement, English language learners, and more. The resources also feature top experts such as Michael Fullan and Douglas Reeves, and show how to put theory into practice. With its focus on long-term improvement, sustainability, and greater internal capacity, School Improvement Network helps its clients close achievement gaps, meet high standards, and increase student learning for both elementary education and secondary education. To learn more about School Improvement Network’s dynamic resources, visit www.schoolimprovement.com.

CONCLUSION

ABOUT SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT NETWORKIntegrated Tracking for Greater Implementation

Improved Student Achievement

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