AchievementFacilitaor	Mentor Program	Peer Facilitator	Leadership Program
Professional Development Schools	Essential Curriculum	MSPAP Information	Summer Catalog

Professional development schools are partnerships between teacher education programs at universities and local public schools or school districts. Their goal: not only to improve teacher education programs but also to restructure public schools, create opportunities for veteran teachers, and bolster education research by putting theories to work in real classrooms._

- National Education Association

Overview of the Program

The Professiona Development School initiative in the state of Maryland has been driven by The Redesign of Teacher Education in Maryland, the mandate issued by the Maryland Higher Education Commission in 1995 that set out to reform the quality of teacher education programs and the quality of professional development for preservice and inservice educators. PDS has served as the cornerstone of teacher education reform, reconnecting P-16 while focusing on learners and learning as well as on continuous assessment..

Goals

A professional development school supports four primary goals:

_ enhanced professional development of preservice teachers through a

clinically-based teacher education program

_ continuous professional development for teacher and university faculty

_ tinquiry into and refinement of effective practice

_ maximization of student achievement

Program History

The Professional Development School (PDS) initiative in Baltimore County Public Schools (BCPS) began in 1994 when Owings Mills Elementary School was reorganized as a teacher education magnet using zero-based staffing and entered a PDS partnership with then Towson State University. The partnership was creatively financed with funds from BCPS_s Office of Staff Development and its Northwest Area Office, Towson University, Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE), and Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC).

Since the 1994-95 academic year, BCPS has formed PDS partnerships with the following institutions of higher education, in addition to Towson University:

_ College of Notre Dame of Maryland

_ Goucher College

_ Johns Hopkins University

_ Loyola College

_ Maryland Institute of Art

_ Morgan State University

_ University of Maryland - Baltimore County

_ Villa Julie College

The following BCPS schools are presently involved in PDS partnerships at varying levels of participation:

_ Chatsworth Elementary _ Milbrook Elementary

_ Church Lane Elementary _ Old Court Middle

_ Cromwell Valley Elementary _ Owings Mills Elementary

_ Dundalk Elementary _ Owings Mills High

_ Eastern Technical High _ Parkville Middle

_ Edgemere Elementary _ Perry Hall Middle

_ Elmwood Elementary _ Pleasant Plains Elementary

_ Franklin Middle _ Randallstown High

_ Halstead Academy _ Ridgely Middle

_ Lansdowne Middle _ Seven Oaks Elementary

_ Loch Raven High _ Sudbrook Middle

For additional information, contact Department of Professional Development at (410) 887-6402 or at pmorgan@bcps.org.

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