Nancy Clark
Head of Upper School
Several decades ago when I was a fledgling teacher, we teachers really did have the whole summer off. A standard reaction as summer neared went something like this: “Oh you teachers, three months off; how great is that!” Though we were tempted to retort that teachers were rather miserably paid and worked long days during the rest of the year, we had to admit that the essential message was correct. School ended in early June, we handed in our grade books (everything was manually documented, of course), left with a stack of books and lesson-planning materials, and did not darken the doors of the school until a day or two after Labor Day. Most of us, of course, did use summer days to fine-tune curricula, craft innovative units, search for new materials, or take a summer school course; but, school-promoted and funded professional development was virtually unheard of. Whatever teachers did from June to September to increase their skills or improve their lessons, they did alone and on their own.
Fast-forward to today and independent schools like ours. Professional development for teachers is standard practice, so much so that even prospective families at our admission open houses frequently ask the question “What do you do to attract and retain the best teachers?” We are fortunate, indeed, to be able to respond that our teachers are very well-paid, given excellent benefit packages, and able to avail themselves of the best possible professional-development opportunities.
Our Institute for Teaching and Learning (ITL), now in its second year, is the Day School’s formalized approach to promoting extensive, ongoing teacher training and development. This summer will be a busy, professionally productive time for the vast majority of our teachers. At last count, about 35 teachers will attend conferences or workshops all over the country. For example, ten teachers will attend specialized math workshops, while seven will attend the highly esteemed Lucy Calkins Reading and Writing workshop. Our tech specialists will attend the conference of the International Society for Technology, and two teachers will take part in the Georgetown Day School Equity Collaborative, considered one of the finest diversity programs in the country. The foreign language teachers will attend a conference promoting differentiation in language classes, and two upper-school English teachers will travel to Ashland, Oregon to take part in the renowned Shakespeare in the Classroom workshop. Four teachers will receive Mindful Schools training to deepen their understanding of “mindfulness,” a teaching approach designed to enhance students’ concentration, attention, conflict-resolution skills, and empathy.
Conferences and workshops represent only a small portion of the ITL grants awarded for summer work. In fact, teachers in every grade and every department will engage in focused, collaborative curriculum work this summer. Because planning time with colleagues is so limited and rare during the school year, the opportunity to meet for long stretches of time to develop or refine curricula and programs has been eagerly seized by our teachers. The ITL committee, which is made up of teachers and administrators, approved more than 30 requests for in-house projects. Many of these will involve grade-level or advisory teams, department colleagues, or special-interest partnerships. Some, like the SFDS Diversity Forum will be attended by all new teachers and staff, as well as scores of returning staff and faculty. Although the range of activities is vast and varied, the common goal is curriculum improvement, pedagogical advancement, and strategic change. To get a sense of our teachers’ activities this summer, consider the following small sample of in-house ITL projects. Members of the science department will examine and refine the scope and sequence of the science curriculum across the grade levels. The first-grade team will work with math specialists to refine the curriculum and incorporate approaches from workshops and conferences. The sixth- and seventh-grade LRP teachers will join forces with the history and English teachers to expand differentiated instruction approaches. Several teams of teachers from kindergarten through eighth grade will consider grade-level appropriate, alternative forms of assessment and reporting. Members of the art department are exploring new ceramic techniques, specifically Raqu. The full corps of English teachers in grades 5-8 will create new approaches to teaching grammar and mechanics, and several grade-level advisory teams will investigate social and emotional learning strategies for use in advisory.
Circling back to the beginning of this article, the prospect of three months away from the serious work of being a teacher is a thing of the past. At San Francisco Day School, we are fortunate to have the financial resources to support our resourceful, seriously professional teachers. The strategies they will learn at conferences and workshops and the work they will do collaboratively will advance the School’s mission cornerstone commitment to educational excellence
