Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

Costa Constantinou (BA, MA, PGCE)

Director of Educational Services

One of the greatest influences on student outcomes is by improving both teaching and learning through effective teacher CPD. Yet few schools evaluate its impact adequately, or even at all. Unless you do so, it is difficult to know to what extent a CPD programme has benefited a school or offered value for money.

The following initial framework will help you go about evaluating CPD:

1. Decide what you want from a CPD programme. If you don’t have set expectations for changing teacher behaviour or other headline objectives, you will never know how successful the programme has been.
2. Determine the tools and criteria you will use to assess progress. These should measure the difference that the CPD programme makes to teacher practice and student outcomes, rather than just evaluate the CPD activity itself. You may be already collecting relevant metrics. If not, you will have to start from scratch.
3. Employ a range of quantitative and qualitative measures, which could be collected by, for example, questionnaires, interviews, focus groups, observations, feedback sheets and reflection logs. This will give you holistic view of any changes that are happening.
4. Apply these tools over an extended period. Research shows that most CPD evaluations are based on participants’ reactions immediately or soon after the CPD programme is finished. As a result, assessment is generally brief, subjective and difficult to interpret. So don’t simply tack evaluation to the end of your CPD programme as an add-on.
5. Make evaluation a positive experience. Unfortunately, all too often it is seen as highlighting failure and undesirable outcomes rather than a necessary requirement for ensuring improvement is appropriately targeted and on-going.
6. Take CPD evaluation seriously. Don’t see it as some tickbox exercise to appease governors, inspectors and other external stakeholders. Properly embrace it as a means to develop pupil learning and the quality of teaching in your school.
7. Don’t make CPD evaluation burdensome. With the right training, a practical and collaborative approach, and the use of appropriately rigorous tools, CPD evaluation can be surprisingly straightforward.
8. Involve everyone who will participate in the evaluation process from the start. CPD evaluations should not be left solely to members of the senior team to impose on others.

CPD evaluation is an often neglected step because it is perceived as challenging. And yes, it does require longterm commitment and planning. However, to ensure that your school and its pupils gain maximum benefit from any professional development programme, assessment of training is not a nicety, but a necessity.

If you struggle to measure CPD effectively, seeking advice and guidance is imperative, because only then can you create the long-term training programmes that are so vital to your school’s development.

Costa Constantinou (BA, MA, PGCE)

Director of Educational Services

Effective teacher CPD improves teaching and learning and has one of the largest impact on student outcomes (Hargreaves, 1994 and Craft, 2000). This means that getting it right is crucial. But, when it comes to CPD, how do we know we are getting it right? It’s a topic I regularly raise in my initial consultation meetings with schools and other educational institutions and it’s often the case that the answer I get tallies with research that states that CPD evaluation is often a neglected step and that many school leaders struggle to carry out any sophisticated, in-depth analysis (Porritt, 2005 and Goodall et al., 2005). It is understandable as there is a reported lack of knowledge and experience needed to carry out such evaluation (Guskey, 2000 and Goodall et al., 2005). Furthermore a report by the Department for Education and Skills on ‘Evaluating the Impact of Continuing Professional Development’ (2005) found that only 24% of schools evaluate changes in pupil attitudes and a fewer than 10% of evaluation taking place rarely influenced the planning of any future CPD.

This worries me. It worries me in terms of ensuring that you get value for money from your training. It worries me in terms of planning using outcomes linked to CPD and, as a former school leader myself, it worries me in terms of ensuring the best education possible for learners. This is something I feel passionately about and why I believe seeking advice and guidance on how to measure CPD effectiveness is imperative. With that in mind, what follows are a few suggestions that can help to structure your thinking when considering how to evaluate your CPD.

The Purpose of evaluating the impact of CPD

One must consider from the outset not only the desired outcomes of CPD, but how these will be measured. What evidence will be obtained to determine and demonstrate that a positive difference is being made? Evaluation serves two purposes. Firstly, to identify whether the programme provides positive outcomes for a school (summative) and secondly, to identify how the programme itself can be further improved (formative). For me, building a long-term CPD programme is vital. It’s only when this is done that you can you accurately assess the gains, as well the next steps you can take.

Where to begin

Thomas Guskey’s five levels of professional development offer a template when thinking about CPD evaluation. These are as follows:

Level 1: Participants reaction

Will the information be useful? Did the material make sense? Was the leader knowledgeable and helpful?

Level 2: Participants learning

Did the learner obtain new knowledge and skills?

Level 3: Organisation, support and change

What was the impact on the organisation? What support was provided to initiate change(s).

Level 4: Participants use of the new knowledge and skills

How does the participant apply new knowledge and skills. How is this assessed?

Level 5: Student outcomes

What is the impact on learners? Achievement, confidence, attendance, behaviour, self-esteem.

Ask yourself whether the type of data you already use can fully answer the questions linked to each of the levels. If not, what changes can be made to make sure that they do? When consulting with schools, I’ve found this to be a useful activity to focus attention on a school’s current CPD programme and how evaluation can go towards improvement. For instance, research shows that the majority of CPD evaluations take place at Level 1 (participant reactions), straight or soon after the CPD programme has taken place. Although obtaining participants reactions is very important, only relying on Level 1 means that the evaluation is often brief, subjective and difficult to interpret. It is important to consider when planning your professional development how each level of evaluation can be put into practice, acted upon and the evidenced. Each level should build on what has come before.

Changing what evaluation means

Evaluation can often be a frightening prospect, however it should never be avoided due to fear of obtaining evidence that might show undesirable outcomes. Evaluations that focus on how teachers’ practice and embed new knowledge and learning from a professional development programme are invaluable for determining impact as well as the time and money spent. Furthermore, CPD evaluation should not be seen as a tick-box exercise for governors, inspectors or other external stakeholders. Investing in this process is about really wanting to improve pupil learning and the quality of teaching in your school.

Evaluating the Impact of CPD in your school

Despite its challenging nature, the long-term commitment and critical planning needed for evaluating the impact of CPD is critical if maximum gains for students are to be achieved — measuring the impact of training is an integral step on the journey towards ensuring the best training and the best outcomes.

Costa Constantinou (BA, MA, PGCE)

Director of Educational Services

References

• Craft, A. (2000). “Continuing Professional Development: A practical guide for teachers and schools”. London: Routledge Falmer.
• Edmonds, S. and Lee, B. (2001). “Teacher Feelings About Continuing Professional Development”. Education Journal, 61, 28–29.
• Goodall, J et al. (2005). “Evaluating the Impact of Continuing Professional Development (CPD)” Department for Education and Skills.
• Guskey, T.R. (2000). “Evaluating Professional Development”. Thousand Oaks, Ca.: Corwin Press.
• Hargreaves, A. (1994). “Changing Teachers: Changing Times”. Toronto: OISE Press.
• Harris, A et al. (2006). “What Difference Does It Make? Evaluating The Impact of Continuing Professional Development In Schools”. Scottish Educational Review, University of Glasgow, Volume 37.
• Ofsted (2006). “The Logical Chain”.
• Porritt, V (2005). “London’s Learning, developing the leadership of CPD”. Department of Education and Skills.

Facts:

The Logical Chain found that few schools evaluated the impact of CPD on teaching and learning.
Ofsted, 2006

Most evaluations seem to draw on the teacher, which can be superficial and lead to bias results.
Harris et al, 2006

The majority of CPD evaluations only look at participants’ reactions. Mostly widely used tool a survey and a questionnaire.

Research findings seem to suggest that schools need greater support and training in order to evaluate the impact of CPD.

Research findings suggest that schools need more support and training in evaluating the impact of CPD.

Only 24% of schools evaluate changes in pupil attitudes — making it the least frequently evaluated aspect.

Evidence suggests many schools still regard INSET days as the main form of teacher CPD.

Organisational change, value for money and changes in teacher behaviour were less likely to be evaluated.
Goodall et al, 2005

Teaching has always been demanding.

When I first entered the profession in 2002, I remember thinking that my own teachers surely couldn’t have worked this hard, or spent so long marking my tests. Clearly they had because I did quite well, and as we know, students don’t get good results without the hard work of effective, passionate teachers. Yet it’s this very workload that leads some 10% of teachers in the UK to leave the profession each year. In the last two years, 90% have thought about getting out, according to a survey of over 16,000 members of the National Union of Teachers’ (NUT).

Research by the Institute of Fiscal Studies (Allen et al, 2016) also shows that around 40% of teachers leave the profession just five years after starting teacher training So, of the 40,000 trainee teachers who will enter the profession this year and next, more than 16,000 will have left by 2023.

The road to retention

It seems that far more teachers than ever before are choosing to say goodbye to classroom life and what would once have been a life-long career.

A 2016 report by the National College for Teaching and Leadership suggests that those in ethnic minorities are often the first to go. According to research by the Runnymede Trust for the NUT, that may be because they often feel they face ‘an invisible glass ceiling’ that stops them being considered for more senior staff jobs. Or, because through racial stereotyping they are given classes exhibiting the most challenging behaviour.

Of course, teaching isn’t for everyone and many graduates of all descriptions will naturally choose to explore alternative career paths.

However, we cannot hide from what such statistics tell us. Nor can we ignore the negative impact this has on the profession, or the barriers it creates to improving teaching standards in our schools.

So, what can we do to improve teacher retention?

Effective CPD works

For me, the answer lies in helping teachers acquire the knowledge and skills they need to become confident and reflective practitioners through better professional development.

Research by Ofsted and others has shown that effective CPD increases morale and enthusiasm for teaching by helping ensure staff feel valued and fulfilled on daily basis. They also become motivated by their own ongoing improvement, irrespective of their experience.

So, how can this be achieved?

• Encourage teachers to attend collaborative CPD events like TeachMeet, or the free events put on by ResearchEd as well as joining the Chartered College of Teaching and connecting with others in the profession through social media. These are all ways to boost morale, build supportive professional networks and stay better informed.
• Taking a bottom-up approach to professional development enables teachers need to get involved in planning the professional development offered within their schools. Engage teachers in talking about the professional development opportunities they would like to see on offer, and what will have the most impact on their practice.
• Provide teachers with regular weekly opportunities to engage in professional development. These learning experiences will be more meaningful if staff are given the chance to feedback and reflect on events they’ve attended.
• Ensure that professional development is informed by high quality educational research. If we want to grow great teachers who are expert classroom practitioners, we must ensure that what they do is evidence informed.
• Give teachers the time needed to implement and embed new knowledge, learning and skills. This doesn’t happen overnight.
• Move away from mock Ofsted lesson observations. These give little meaningful feedback and are often judgemental. Evidence also suggests that they do very little to improve the quality of education students receive.
• Make departmental and whole school meetings real opportunities for teachers to come together to learn, share successes, collaborate and reflect. Using meeting time to work through a tick-list of ‘to dos’ will not have a meaningful impact on pupils and staff.
• Introduce robust CPD evaluation. Knowing what works and what doesn’t is vital for ensuring our teachers have access to the right tools and latest thinking. The most effective teachers generate learning in their students at four times the rate of novice teachers (William, 2011). This means it’s imperative that more inexperienced staff are helped to bridge that gap as quickly as possible.

Review your CPD model

Creating a supportive environment is crucial in helping those in their first years of teaching to feel valued. So, when reviewing your CPD model, you need to think about how to develop a culture that helps retain teachers in your school.

A CPD programme that allows teachers to shadow and learn from colleagues, and where time is given over to regular dialogues about best practice and to coaching conversations on evidence-based approaches, will make a real difference to the well-being and longevity of teachers.

As school leaders, we all have a responsibility towards those new to the profession to provide professional development opportunities that actually help them improve.

If that’s not what’s happening, we need to make changes, because if we continue to get this wrong, our children’s learning will suffer, something that none of us want.

Costa Constantinou (BA, MA, PGCE)

Director of Educational Services

We know that effective teacher CPD improves teaching and learning and has one of the largest
impacts on student outcomes (Hargreaves, 1994 and Craft, 2000, Cordingley, P. et al, 2015). This means that getting it right is crucial. Without measuring the positive difference that training provides, is it even worthy of the title of ‘development’? As a former school leader and through my work with Veema Education, I firmly believe it’s imperative that school leaders and external providers ensure professional development is having an impact and helping
teachers to improve. With any type of teacher CPD activity (whether this is an INSET day/s, twilight, conference or ongoing programme) if time isn’t allocated to consider and plan both in the short- term and long-term, as well as the resources needed to be in place to ensure success, then enthusiasm and dedication from staff for embedding change will be short-lived. That is why I ensure that my visits to schools are not seen as achieving a ‘quick-gain’ or a time filler at the start or end of year instead, they are more about the work that has taken place prior to a visit and the follow-up is to support school leaders meet the predetermined professional development and improvement objectives. For me, support is most effective as a continuum.

Costa Constantinou (BA, MA, PGCE)

Director of Educational Services