#04-290
Oct. 19, 2004

GSW School of Education awarded more than $400,000 in federal funding to build unique national consortium

AMERICUS--Georgia Southwestern State University is stepping forward to fill an educational development need that is designed to benefit all of America's school children. 

GSW has recently been awarded a federal grant from the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for the Improvement of Post Secondary Education (FIPSE). The grant award totals $402,676 over three years. This FIPSE-funded project, titled "Documenting and Disseminating the Effectiveness of Professional Development Schools in Improving Teacher Quality & Retention, Student Learning & Achievement" is national in scope and a fully collaborative initiative. According to Mary Gendernalik Cooper, Ph.D., dean of the School of Education and the project's director, the grant will be used to create and implement an enhanced Web sharing of Professional Development School (PDS) effectiveness. 

As outlined by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), PDSs are innovative institutions formed through partnerships between professional education programs and P-12 schools. PDS partnerships have a four-fold mission that includes the preparation of new teachers, faculty development, inquiry directed at the improvement of practice, and enhanced student achievement. PDSs are designed to improve both the quality of teaching and student learning. 

"PDSs are grounded in the same concepts of professional preparation as teaching hospitals in the health care fields," Cooper said. As practicing professions, both teaching and medicine require a sound academic program coupled with intensive and fully integrated clinical preparation. Just as teaching hospitals are designed to provide clinical preparation for medical students and interns, PDSs serve the same function for teacher candidates and faculty, Cooper said. Both settings provide support for professional learning in the real world of actual practice. 

This project is designed to illuminate the knowledge created, lessons learned, and insights gained from such practice. 

"We have a pivotal opportunity to create a national network that builds and disseminates the evidence of how Professional Development Schools distinctly contribute to improved teaching quality and student achievement," Cooper said. "This is a unique effort that is much more involved than simply creating a repository of information. Technology now makes possible the creation of this electronic master hub through which interactive data collection, analysis, and reporting on PDS effectiveness in relation to teacher quality and effectiveness, and student learning and achievement can be compiled, categorized, and reported to practitioners, educator preparation units, policy makers and the public." 

Meanwhile, GSW has launched its own PDS network for Southwest Georgia. By adopting national PDS standards and committing to an ongoing partnership with the University, participating school districts and their individual institutions collaborate in improving educator preparation, enhancing student achievement, continuing professional development, and contributing to the knowledge-base of the profession. Currently 26 schools in six area school systems make up the GSW PDS Network. 

Collaborating partners in the FIPSE project include: the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, the National Education Association-Professional Development Research Project, the Maryland State Department of Education, the Towson University College of Education, the University System of Georgia and GSW. Jane Neapolitan, Ed.D., director of Towson University's Institute for PDS Studies is serving as the instrumentation/measurement coordinator; Boris Peltsverger, Ph.D, dean of GSW's School of Computer and Information Sciences, is serving as the Web site construction designer; and Holly J. Thornton, Ph.D., associate professor at the University of North Carolina Greensboro is serving as the project evaluator. A National Consortium Board of Advisors, representing over 20 additional organizations and agencies will assist in the project's development, implementation, evaluation and national dissemination. 

The overall project commitment totals nearly $600,000, which includes the $402,676, or 67 percent, federal funding. The remaining $197,160 is being contributed by non-federal sources-the project's collaborating partners.

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