District-wide Professional Development - A Capstone Project

There are about 20 of my colleagues and I are enrolled in a cohort working on earning our Technology Specialist certification.  Currently, we are learning more about 21st Century Leadership.  Part of that leadership is around professional development.  For our Capstone Project, we are designing a Professional Development opportunity for staff across our district.  The goal is to improve culture, foster collaboration, and encourage innovative teaching practices across the district.

It is exciting to be part of this Capstone Project that has the potential to positively impact our entire district.  Just thinking that our small group of 20 educators can jumpstart a movement across the entire district is energizing in itself. 

For me, the struggle has been real though. Mostly because we are trying to work with such a large group of people who all have busy lives and not much time to connect.  On top of that, trying to work digitally, presents a bit of a struggle.  Not everyone is online at the same time, we are working asynchronously so making decisions becomes a challenge.  If we were to meet in person to work on this, it may be more productive.  At one point the design group was making plans for challenges.  When the larger group head the direction we were going, they weren't really on board with that, so we had to change directions.  It can be difficult to plan a large scale professional development when the entire group doesn't have the same clear vision.

Also, there are different groups spearheading different parts of the project.  One group needs another group to complete their work before they can begin on their own part of the project.  Before this course is over, we need a solid plan and timeline, so we can meet our kickoff deadline.  We need to identify and agree upon our challenges.  Then the promotion and incentive group can get to work on their part.  I like the idea of having a website with a link to a Google form on which participants can submit their artifacts.  I also like that the challenges increasingly build collaboration.  I like the ideas for incentivizing participation.  There are lots of great ideas, we just need to put them all together in a seamless rollout.

But, we must come together for the good of the district, because I truly believe that D181 is better when we work together.  #D181BetterTogether