ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

I. Philosophy of Supervision & Professional Development

Through my experience as a public school educator over the past three years, I have found that

one of the key components to any aspect of supervision, evaluation, and professional development is
trust trust amongst both administrators and teachers. It is a professional trust centered on the
understanding that everything teachers are asked to do and/or learn is not only in their best interest but
also in the best interest of their students. Effective school leaders know that developing and fostering
trust amongst their staff must be the foundation for any professional learning. Teachers need to feel
confident that their administrators are focused on providing them with support so that they may in turn
support their students to the best of their ability. Teachers also need to feel confident that their
administrators are providing them with high quality professional development experiences that are
relative to the schools overall mission, vision, and goals. School leaders need to make building the culture
of their school a top priority in all instructional decisions.

Developing trust amongst teachers and supervisors can be a daunting task and often is difficult to

pinpoint strategies that help to foster that trust. According to the Northwest Regional Educational
Laboratory (2003), there are five key components to trust:
1) Benevolence having confidence that another party has your best interests at heart
2) Reliability refers to the extent to which you can count on another party to come through for you
3) Competence belief in another partys ability to perform the tasks required by his or her position
4) Honesty a persons integrity, character, and authenticity
5) Openness how freely another party shares information with others

These five characteristics of trust should not apply only to administrators but also to teachers. An

administrator will be more willing to seek out high quality professional development if they feel their
staff will be reliable with the information and will seek to implement new instructional strategies with
fidelity, being open to trying new practices in their classroom. If an administrator is consistently faced

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School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

with backlash and resistance toward professional development opportunities, they will be less likely to
go out of their way to ensure those learning experiences are of high quality and serve both teachers and
students. Unfortunately, too many professional learning activities are disconnected from teachers actual
practice and school improvement goals and are not designed with attention to the needs of adult
learners (Archibald, 2011, p. 2). According to a meta-analysis on effective professional development,
high quality professional development exhibits the following five characteristics:
1) Alignment with school goals, state and district standards and assessments, and other professional
learning activities including formative teacher evaluation
2) Focus on core content and modeling of teaching strategies for the content
3) Inclusion of opportunities for active learning of new teaching strategies
4) Provision of opportunities for collaboration among teachers
5) Inclusion of embedded follow-up and continuous feedback (Archibald, 2011, p. 3).

Therefore, a key component to professional development is connection to each individual

teachers classroom as well as connection to the overall school mission and goals. It is the responsibility
of school leaders to provide teachers with a focus vision of improvement. The teaching profession is one
that can never be perfected and takes continual work to improve. When school leaders provide a
narrowed, specific vision and set of goals for the school and teachers, teachers are able to focus their
improvement on one strategy at a time. Developing their teaching practices step by step without trying to
perfect everything at once. Each professional development experience should include an opportunity or
teachers to provide feedback to administrators in regards to their learning. Administrators, in turn, must
listen to that feedback to help shape and design the following professional development. In addition,
maximizing time for teacher collaboration must be a priority for school leaders. Allowing teachers to
collaborate helps individual teachers to improve their practice by learning from one another, helps to
create a shared sense of direction for teams of teachers, and helps to create accountability amongst

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

teachers. Teacher collaboration also helps to extend the supervision of administrators to teacher leaders.
Administrators can delegate accountability strategies to lead teachers, which is often less threatening for
staff evaluations. Supervision and evaluation should be a combined effort of self evaluation, peer
evaluation, and formal evaluations conducted by administrators.

An effective administrator must be an effective manager, leader, and supervisor in order to

maximize teacher effectiveness and ultimately student achievement. While each administrator is unique
and requires varying strategies, all administrators will find success with supervision if they ensure the
following: trust amongst administrators and teachers, high quality professional development experiences
based upon teacher feedback and student needs, established goals and means of measuring
improvement, and time for structured teacher collaboration.

II. Supervisory Structure (Adapted from Minot Public Schools Minot, ND 2005)


The foundation of any school supervisory structure lies in the schools beliefs, values, and overall
shared vision.

A. District Beliefs (Canton Local Schools)

All aspects of teacher evaluation and supervision are founded on the following beliefs:
The purpose of schools is to open minds, expand thinking, and instill a love of learning that allows each
child to prepare for the future.

Every day we foster a culture of pride in our schools, created by positive relationships and meaningful
work.

We are committed to preparing our students to be flexible, collaborative, creative, life-long learners.

All our students have the potential to learn more than they are currently learning, and it is the
responsibility of all they encounter in our schools to support their learning.

The focus of all school activity is the design of high-quality, engaging work that students find interesting
and relevant and that challenges them to reach their highest potential.
Schools that are focused on engagement are the responsibility of the entire community; we take pride in
the relationships among our community and our schools, characterized by collaborative partnership,
open and honest dialog, mutual respect, and trust.

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

B. Staff Vision (Minot Public Schools)

All staff members:
demonstrate professionalism, competence, confidence, and integrity.
set goals as a means of achieving learning objectives.
demonstrate values of trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring, and citizenship.
modify instruction and curriculum to create effective learning environments.
create a culture that supports innovation, creativity, and change.
participate in staff development opportunities consistent with the districts mission, beliefs, values, and
vision.
use mentoring experiences that provide professional orientation for new teachers and principals.
exhibit a willingness to implement new ideas, concepts, or strategies to create a more effective learning
environment.

C. Teacher Evaluation Process (OTES)

Teachers will be evaluated according to the Ohio Teacher Evaluation System, which includes the
following:
o Professional Growth Plan (aligned with District Goals)
o Two 30-minute observations
o Walkthroughs (Individual school discretion)
o Student academic growth (as demonstrated through Student Learning Objectives)
Each teacher will be evaluated according to the Ohio Revised Code and an evaluation framework that is
aligned with the Standards for the Teaching Profession adopted under state law.


D. District Educational Goal-Setting
District: Each year, it will be the responsibility of the district to provide district goals associated with
teacher professional development and student achievement.

School: Consequently, it will be the responsibility of each building administrator to generate at least two
building goals connected to the provided district goals. Examples of building goals are provided below:
o Increase student performance on Ohio Achievement test by 3% from previous school year
o Increase teacher collaboration through bi-weekly meetings by department, grade level, etc.
o Increase specific subgroup performance on Ohio Graduation Test by at least 2%
o Increase the use of formative assessment in daily instruction

Teacher: Each individual teacher, alongside administrators/supervisors, will develop a minimum of two
goals that will contribute to the overall school goals listed above. All teachers will complete the goal-

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

setting process regardless of OTES outcomes. The final goals should be an outgrowth of a cooperative
activity between the teacher and supervisor and should be mutually agreed upon. These goals should be
connected to each teachers Professional Growth Plan completed for the OTES.

It is recommended that the goals be established in accordance with their potential impact on
student learning. Goals should be individual and specific. The following priorities should be used as
guidelines in determining the appropriateness of goals.
1. Teaching Goals - Goals built around teaching behaviors that are directly related to student outcomes.
2. Learner Goals - Goals that relate directly to implementing a specific learning activity or improving a
particular student deficit.
3. Program Goals - Goals that relate to curriculum areas, course outlines, class activities, materials
selection, etc.
4. Organizational and Administrative Goals - Goals that deal with specific administrative criteria. Only
in the case of continuing problems in this area would the goal setting procedure be used to help improve
this situation.
5. District Goals - Goals that deal with specific administrative criteria. Only in the case of continuing
problems in this area would the goal setting procedure be used to help improve this situation.

Teachers Professional Goal Form (Minot Public Schools)

Goal Setting
Below is a list of educational goals that have been developed in accordance with the goal setting procedures of
the school districts supervisory process.
Teacher Name _____________________________________________
School___________________________________________ Subject/Grade ___________________________
Date ______________________
Goal #1:
Goal #2:
Goal #3:
Goal #4:
Please Note: Professional goals should be specific, measurable, attainable, results centered and time-bound.
Begin a goal statement with measurable words such as define, implement, identify, develop, design, apply and
select.
A discussion of these mutually agreed upon goals has occurred between the teacher and principal.
Teachers Signature___________________________________________________ Date ______________
Principals Signature___________________________________________________ Date ______________

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

Evaluation Protocols

Option 1: OTES Teacher Performance Evaluation Rubric

Option 2: Teacher Evaluation Document (Minot Public Schools)

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

Using Minot Public Schools Evaluation Document, this teacher would be recommended for continued
employment as well as fall under the Skilled rating for the Ohio Teacher Evaluation System.

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

Interview Questions: Evaluation with Principal of Canton South High School, Jeff Moore

To engage in constructive conversations about the alignment of student and educator performance,
leaders cultivate a culture based on the norms of high expectations, shared responsibility, mutual respect,
and relational trust. (Learning Forward, Professional Learning Standards)

o What strategies have been implemented in your school to accomplish the standard above?
What kinds of professional learning/collaboration are you using to build a culture of high
expectations, shared responsibility, mutual respect, and relational trust?
Obviously we have tried to use the current eval process as a non-threatening, learning experience with
feedback coming from both teachers and evaluators. Our district has been using Professional Development to
help our staff with assessments and classroom organization. We also have an implementation of PLC time for
grade levels and departments so our staff can use each other as resources. We are trying to build trust by
encouraging our staff members to try new things in the classroom, ask for help without fear of repercussions,
and good faith with decisions.
o What is the key to balancing evaluation and trust between teachers and administrators?
Trust starts long before the evaluation process. If that trust has been built then the eval process is not as
scary. But you have to be honest with your staff, that does not mean you have to be mean or disrespectful. If
they cannot deal with the fact that we are looking to improve then the teacher needs to reflect.
o In your opinion, should a school supervisory structure include lead teachers as a part of the
evaluation process? Can evaluation be delegated? Who should be evaluating building teachers?
I will say no to the lead teachers being evaluators, however I will clarify with the statement that each district is
different on what a lead teacher means. Large districts use lead teachers in a much different role than smaller
ones do. In large districts it would be easier to implement the leads into a evaluator role, some districts use
them in a non teacher role.
o What is your schools improvement process for teachers that have been evaluated as
ineffective?
We follow the state guidelines with improvement plans. One thing that I believe in is having teachers develop
their own plan. I believe it helps develop buy in. I will let them know what they need to work on, but they need
to develop the plan to correct this.
o What does shared leadership look like in your building? district?
I am trying to push for more of a shared leadership process within our building. We are in no way a full
fledged shared leadership process. But I do believe we are moving toward more of the shared influence. The
guiding statement I do follow is, "The more it impacts teaching and learning the more we need the shared
process."
o How do you use data to assess overall teacher performance?
Currently we use the Student Learning Objective (SLO) data for 50% of our teacher evaluation.

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

Interview Questions: Professional Development, Director of Career & Technical Education

o What types/kinds of professional learning communities are utilized in your district? (grade
level, department, etc.)



Walker Elementary Grade level, RTI, as well as various other committees


Faircrest Middle School Grade level, department, RTI


Canton South High School Grade level, department, RTI, and various other committees

o Are protocols used to assess the productivity of professional learning communities in your
district? Is there an accountability system in place?




This is something we, as a central office staff, have recently decided to focus onwe feel we have

mastered the PLC but need work on how we are getting feedback and monitoring results.

o How is teacher feedback/choice used to design professional development experiences?


After each professional development session, teachers are asked to rate their level of engagement

through a survey or exit slip. This is very important to us as a central office staff and also helps to

guide building leaders in their schools professional development.

o How does the school leadership determine the focus of professional development?


This year, in particular, we are focusing on the Ohio Improvement Process. We have chosen to

start with formative assessment and vocabulary as the foundation. So far, these professional

development sessions have been very successful.

o What are some key characteristics of high quality professional development?


First, its about listening to the staff and how they prefer to engage in professional development

we rarely meet in large groups and try to keep the work centered on each individual teachers

content area so they feel what they are doing is impacting their specific classroom. We also try to

make sure the teachers leave with something they feel good about and ready to implement

practically into their classrooms.

ED 607, Final Project

School Supervision & Professional Development

K. Betler

References

Archibald, S., Coggshall, J., Croft, A., & Goe, L. (2011). High quality professional development for all

teachers: effectively allocating resources. National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality.

Retrieved from http://www.gtlcenter.org/sites/default/files/docs/HighQualityProfessional

Development.pdf
Brewster, C. & Railsback, J. (2003). Building trusting relationships for school improvement. Northwest

Regional Educational Laboratory. Retrieved from http://educationnorthwest.org/sites/

default/files/trust.pdf
Minot Public Schools. (2005). Performance based teacher supervision manual. Retrieved from

http://pages.minot.k12.nd.us/pdf/206/Teacher_Supervision_Manual.pdf