The 2004-05 school year will mark a milestone in the history of the Elementary Professional Development School (PDS) Collaborative between the State College Area School District and Penn State's College of Education. What began as a pilot program in 1999 with 14 interns in two elementary schools, will expand to become a Professional Development District (PDD) with 62 interns in all ten district elementary schools next year. Along the journey from PDS to PDD, the program has received two national awards. In 2002, the Association of Teacher Educators named the collaborative as the Distinguished Program in Teacher Education This past January, The Holmes Partnership, a national organization devoted to school-university partnerships, named the State College - Penn State partnership as the Outstanding Partnership in the Nation.

The purpose of the professional development school program can be summed up in three Es: Enhancing the educational experiences of all children; Ensuring high quality induction for new teachers into the profession; and Enabling veteran teachers and teacher educators to enhance their own professional growth through collaboration. One of the centerpieces of the collaborative is a yearlong internship program in which Penn State undergraduate students spend the entire school year teaching elementary children under the guidance of a veteran classroom teacher who mentors the intern. During the six years of its existence, PDS interns have taught in 176 elementary classrooms in the district, serving more than 3,000 students. The quality of the program is assessed in many ways each year including a survey that is sent to all parents whose children have been taught by an intern. The approximately 1,400 parental responses that have been returned to date have extremely positive. Parents believe that their children benefit greatly from having an intern in the classroom because they receive more one on one attention and support. Mentor teachers also report that the children in their classroom benefit from having another professional in the classroom who can get to know each child and provide instruction that is suited to meet the child’s needs.

A second feature of the PDS collaborative that has drawn praise at the national level is the focus on teacher development through inquiry. Interns, veteran teachers and teacher educators work side by side to study the process of learning and teaching in a systematic manner. Interns reflect on their teaching and select a question, or wondering, which they turn into research project. Then, they collect appropriate data, analyze their results and share their new insights by writing a paper and presenting their findings. In addition, many mentor teachers complete inquiry projects of their own. The results of the inquiry projects are shared each year at the Annual Teacher inquiry Conference.

For more information on the Professional Development School, go to the Professional Development School Web site at www.ed.psu.edu/pds.