Goal: Project OPEN's goal is to facilitate identification, development, and delivery of quality online professional development (OPD) courses for Maryland's teachers and administrators.

Year Two Consortium work included:

• created standards for effective online professional development,
• conducted surveys to identify participating school districts’ priority needs for online professional development courses and which courses they currently are offering or developing,
• provided two, day-long workshops to train educators from ten school districts in strategies that improve completion rates of teachers in OPD courses,
• ensured that partners have their own e-learning platform, and
• developed and piloted an online version of the CPD course Materials for Teaching Reading K-8, a requirement for all K-8 teachers in Maryland.

During the remainder of Year 2 of the grant, Project OPEN will:

• identify quality commercial courses that address local school system priorities and, where necessary, develop courses that address them,
• develop an efficient mechanism for sharing with OPD course developers and facilitators the evaluation instruments and other tools that OPEN has created,
• resolve intellectual property concerns,
• collaborate with other Ed Tech grants partners to facilitate appropriate linkages and seamless delivery of learning modules,
• create a communications path that will help school districts avoid creating courses already available elsewhere in the state, and
• revise and disseminate the Materials for Teaching Reading K-8 course to help teachers across Maryland meet this essential certification requirement.

Lead County: Prince George's County
Grant Director: Judith D. Finch, Ed.D.
Grant Facilitator: Bev Brown
MSDE Facilitator: Liz Glowa lglowa@msde.state.md.us

Members of Project OPEN are: Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Dorchester, Frederick, Montgomery, Prince George's, Queen Anne’s, Washington, Wicomico, and Baltimore City Public Schools.

For more information about Project OPEN, visit the Project OPEN website at http://www.pgcps.org/%7Eprojopen/.