Portfolio Part Three:

Professional Responsibility

Bella Thayer

Vermont State University - Castleton Campus

Spring 2024
Introduction

Learning is the single most essential goal of education; however, this goal does not end

with students. It is vital for educators to continue their own learning throughout their careers in

order to be the best teacher they can be, and in order to ensure that students are receiving

instruction in the most effective way possible. Although educators may feel that they are experts

in their content areas, there is always more to learn in one's own content area and certainly in the

study of education. Educators must seek to continue their own learning in order to teach in a way

that is most effective and ethical.

Educators must always be fully aware of the laws in their state in order to practice in an

ethical manner. Since laws are continuously changing and new laws involving education are

often being addressed at the state level, educators must continue their education of the law.

However, an educator needs more than laws to truly teach in an ethical way. For this reason,

educators must seek professional development. The importance of this in terms of the impact

within the classroom cannot be understanded as educators are responsible for ensuring that

students will be successful members of society, and a large part of this is reflected in the

behaviors modeled by educators. Students need to observe productive collaboration and moral

practices between their classroom educators, as well as all stakeholders in their education

including guardians, community members, and other school professionals.

Ongoing professional development and a personal commitment to continued learning are

two goals that are vital to education, and to educators on an individual level. One must be fully

committed to both in order to be a successful educator. The research on the importance of these

goals, as well as experience I have had in the field, stand to prove the importance of these

principles.
Standard 9: Professional Learning and Ethical Practice

PC 9.1: Candidates are prepared for self-directed, continuous professional learning.

Description

Continuous professional development and learning is essential in education because education is

forever changing and evolving as more research is done and new best practices are established. It

is important for educators to continue this type of professional development in order to ensure

that students are receiving the best and most up to date education possible. It is essential that

educators continue professional education in both education as a whole as well as the educators

content area. It is also essential that educators seek out this education on their own, as districts

may not provide the education that is needed for educators on a personal level, but rather in

terms of the district's goals. It is vital for educators to seek this learning in order to ensure that

they are the best and most up to date educators possible, and to ensure that students are learning

in a manner that is most effective. Self-directed learning may not always be the easiest way to

receive information; however, in the field of education self-directed learning is often the most

effective way for an educator to ensure that they are the most skilled and well informed teacher

they can be.

Salient Evidence & Analysis

Continual education is important in the field of teaching because the world and society

are continually changing. One article, titled What Factors Matter for the Sustainable

Professional Development of Teachers? Analysis from Four Countries (2020), addresses the

changes in society that make professional development so vital. The article discusses how as

“economic, environmental and globalization challenges constantly arise, sustainable

development is seen as a key factor in the development of society in the 21st century”

(Brandisauskiene, et. al, 2020). The article states that professional development is especially

important in education because of the unique role educators possess in terms of “implementing

the sustainable development

goals and ensuring economic, environmental and social sustainability” (Brandisauskiene, et. al,

2020). This is the role of educators because it is also the essential goal of education to teach

students how to grow into members of society who have the ability to act responsibility and hold

a responsible attitude.

The article makes the case that educators need to slightly shift their focus in terms of

professional development to place more emphasis on the importance of this sustainability within

society. The article also argues that professional development in education in the past, and

currently, focuses more on educating teachers in terms of curricula and assessment models.

However, it may be more meaningful to view educators as active creators of knowledge rather

than “recipients of knowledge”. This means that it may be more beneficial for both students and

teachers to involve educators far more in professional development, and view this continued

education as a collaboration between the educator and the body educating them, rather than

simply an exchange of knowledge (Brandisauskiene, et. al, 2020).

In the surveys outlined in this article it was found that the majority of educators were

receiving their continued education in a manner that was very traditional, such as seminars and

courses. This form of professional development is much closer aligned with an exchange of

knowledge, rather than the educators being active participants in their own professional

development. However, the article noted that young educators in Lithuania defied these statistics

and did prove to be active participants in their professional development as they seeked out
opportunities in which they had more partnership and collaboration with those educating them.

Ultimately, this article as well as the surveys conducted, confirmed that collaboration in

continued education is one of the most vital preconditions to ensuring that sustainable practices

are being taught in such professional development, and are being implemented in the classroom

(Brandisauskiene, et. al, 2020).

Another article addressed professional development in education, specifically focusing on

the support social studies educators receive in terms of teaching students with disabilities (SWD)

and in terms of teaching English language learning (ELL) students. This article, Can we meet our

mission? Examining the professional development of social studies teachers to support students

with disabilities and emergent bilingual learners (2020), stated a shocking fact about the support

social studies educators received. The article stated that as of 2016 the National Council of

Social Studies published a bulletin discussing “exceptional learners” and found that the research

examining the relationship between social studies and special education was “scant” and there

was only one book on the topic prior to this bulletin. This highlights an extreme need for

professional development in the area of the relationship between social studies and special

education (Mullins, 2020).

The article also points out how vital professional development is, and states that

continued learning of educators is one of the key factors in improving America’s schools.

Although the majority of educators and administrators are aware of this fact and agree with it,

the way in which this professional development is being delivered is often problematic or

lacking. The NCSS found that social studies professional development was lacking and this

resulted in federal funding of the Teaching American History grants program. This program

furthered educators' knowledge of American history with the hope that this would improve
students' knowledge. While this program may have been beneficial in ways, research suggests

that professional development in social studies is lacking in terms of special education and

teaching foreign language students. For this reason it does not make sense to focus educators'

continual education on American history when this is not the area in which most social studies

educators are struggling.

The article looked to examine if social studies teachers were receiving adequate

professional development. Despite social studies educators having some of the highest caseloads

of ELLs and SWDs, only 40% of educators received professional development regarding SWD.

The results found that among this 40% the majority of the professional development revolved

around teaching economics to SWD while the least focused on social studies subject was

geography. This is a staggering fact considering that in terms of social studies there is the highest

caseload over all of SWDs in geography, and the lowest caseload overall of SWDs is in

economics (Mullins, 2020). From this article it can be concluded that educators need far more

professional development in terms of working with SWDs and ELLs, and it can also be

concluded that social studies professional development is lacking. It is clear that educators need

to be far more active participants in their own professional development, and those creating these

continued education courses and programs need to be more in tune with the needs of students

and classroom educators.

Both articles prove how vital it is for educators to be active participants in the

development and delivery of their own professional development. Not only does this allow

educators to focus on the areas that are lacking in their respective fields, but this has also been

proven to be the most effective way to go about professional development. In my experience I

have focused heavily on my goals as an educator and my goals for my students. I have written at
length about the goals I wish to accomplish with students in the classroom including: students

having an understanding of the importance of being an active and well informed member of

society through the democratic process of voting, students having an understanding for the

importance of history and why it is relevant to their lives, and students will having a sense of

compassion and understanding for others, among others.

Writing about goals for students and educators can be very beneficial to educators in

terms of them developing their professional development. Doing this allows educators to see the

gaps in their own classroom and education, and in turn allows them to better focus their own

professional development. It is especially important for social studies educators to explicitly

focus on what they need out of their professional development to ensure that they are meeting

these goals. This is because of how professional development in this field has lacked in the past.

Writing about these goals explicitly will allow me to better focus my own self-directed

professional development. Goals Paper Thayer

Reflection

It is well known within the field of education that professional development is essential to

being an effective educator. However, what is less focused on is how the existing professional

development and continued education opportunities in social studies are lacking. Evidence has

shown that professional development is lacking especially in terms of the relationship between

social studies and special education, as well as in terms of the relationship between social studies

and English Language Learners. This has resulted in gaps in social studies educators skills, and

as a result it is even more vital that social studies teachers focus on self-directed professional

development in order to fill these gaps, and ensure that they are the most effective social studies

educators they can be for the highest number of students possible. This includes both English
Language Learners and students with learning disabilities, as well as the general student

population.

Standard 10: Leadership and Collaboration

PC 10.1 Candidates are prepared to collaborate with learners, families, colleagues, other
school professionals, and community members to ensure student learning.

Description

Collaboration is one of the most important aspects of education in terms of student

success. It is vital for educators to collaborate with all parts of a student's academic community,

including parents and other school professionals, in order to ensure a student succeeds and is

provided all the support they need. This is also an aspect of education that can oftentimes be

lacking on the secondary level as parents can become less involved in their children's academics,

and educators often communicate less with parents or guardians. However, it is essential for

educators to collaborate with stakeholders at this level as secondary age students still need

support from their schools in order to thrive. Students can become unmotivated very quickly at

the secondary level if they feel there is no hope to complete school, or if they feel that they have

already established themselves as ‘bad students’. In order to overcome these obstacles and ensure

that students are able to graduate and transition out of school it is essential for educators to

collaborate with stakeholders. Regardless of a student's academic or behavioral standing,

consistent collaboration between educators and parents/guardians is vital to student support.

Salient Evidence & Analysis

 Collaborating with stakeholders is one of the most influential strategies one can use as an

educator to help support a student who may be struggling. Students face many difficulties in their

personal lives, and when these difficulties begin impacting their academics it is an educator's job

to determine how to best support that student within their classroom. For many students this

collaboration between stakeholders is what allows them to graduate and begin their adult lives

successfully. In order to get a student to this point student learning needs to take place, and this

can be difficult if a student is withdrawn.

Student disconnection from education is high in the United States, and when considering

how wealthy the country is and comparing it to similar nations the level of student disconnect is

considerably higher. A study titled Predictors of Secondary Completion Among Homeless Youth

in Three U.S. Cities and the Potential Application of National Policies (2022), found that student

disconnection is considerably higher among students that are homeless or living in poverty. This

is very significant as the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted economic stability meaning that

more families are living with financial difficulties. This result of the pandemic, combined with

the period of online learning, has had significant impacts on student’s academic engagement

(Hatch, et. al, 2022).

Although this study primarily focused on homeless youth it did find that the most

significant factor in secondary students not completing school is disconnection from education.

Because disconnection from education is so prevalent post COID-19, this article can be applied

in a broader sense. The study found that support and access to resources are two vital factors in

students completing secondary education. These are two factors that are lacking for students

living in poverty as social services are often very disconnected and educational facilities often do

not have the resources and support services that at-risk youth require throughout their
educational careers. Because of this students are forced to navigate systems that are highly

fragmented and this leaves them without the support services they need. For this reason, the

study states that cross-sector collaboration is one of the most important factors in terms of

secondary education completion. The study also found that resiliency is the single most

important factor in terms of at-risk youth completing school, and that resiliency can be promoted

in many ways; one of which being “collaboration among service providers” (Hatch, et. al,

2022).

For educators, this means that they need to be doing everything in their power to ensure

that they are communicating with as many stakeholders as possible, or as needed, for their

students to aid them in receiving as much support as possible. This study illustrates the lack of

collaboration in school systems, and even more so between systems. This further proves how

important it is for educators to collaborate with families, colleagues, other school professionals,

and community members. Resilience and collaboration have strong impacts on student success,

and the two often go hand in hand in an educational setting.

Another article, titled True partners? Exploring family-school partnership in secondary

education from a collaboration perspective (2022), aimed to assess how vital family-school

partnership is in terms of student success. The article states that these partnerships are highly

beneficial in terms of both student’s academic success, and “the well-being and motivation of

students” (Gerdes, et. al, 2022). However, it is also pointed out how difficult this relationship can

be to maintain at the secondary level as this age group of students is gaining more autonomy and

thus the school becomes the students' realm rather than one shared with parents. It is stated that

transformation is the primary activity in a collaborative interaction, but also that having a

connection is needed before true collaboration can take place. To build this connection with
stakeholders in an academic setting the article points to cooperation and coordination as two

effective ways to gain this connection. Cooperation, according to the article, refers to the transfer

of knowledge. This is an essential point in building connections as educators need to share

knowledge of how students are performing in schools, and families need to share knowledge of

how students are doing on a more holistic level. Coordination in this instance refers to the

‘translation of knowledge’. This can take the form of a parent informing a teacher why a student

may display a certain behavior and explaining what the parent does at home to combat this

behavior. This allows the educator to better connect with the student; however, parents need to

be given the opportunity to participate in this collaboration and involving them is the

responsibility of the educator (Gerdes, et. al, 2022).

It has long been felt that collaboration is lacking in many ways at the secondary level.

Educators, parents, school systems, and social services often rely on the student to effectively

navigate through these confusing and disconnected systems. However, evidence has shown that

when educators are involved in cross section collaboration regarding a student the student has a

far higher chance of succeeding. It has been proven that this type of collaboration can have

profound impacts on student success, especially for at-risk youth.

In my educational experience I have practiced this type of cross section collaboration in

the form of an ill structured problem. I explored the topic of student engagement and stress after

the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to successfully evaluate this engagement I worked with a

classroom educator, a special educator, and middle level students. Collaborating in this way

allowed for an understanding of multiple perspectives, and in turn allowed for a better

understanding of student behavior. Although this collaboration was not surrounding a specific

student, but rather a specific issue, it still exemplified how working with multiple parties allows
for a better understanding and more productive partnership. Interviewing a special educator

produced far different results than speaking with a classroom teacher. This is because they have

had different experiences with students and thus different opinions about the impact on students.

Hearing all of these opinions is vital in terms of determining how much the pandemic truly has

impacted students. Evaluating the impact of the pandemic on students this way allowed me to see

both the more positive sides of the outcome, as well as the negative. Although the classroom

educator I spoke with felt there were more negatives to come out of pandemic learning, the

special educator I spoke with felt that the pandemic has made students more compassionate and

empathetic. Without involving multiple parties there is no true way to evaluate the impact of the

pandemic accurately ISP Project .

Reflection

As a future educator it is important to me that I am able to effectively collaborate with

any stakeholders involving a student. This is because all students deserve to be provided with the

most support possible. Students need to feel supported both at school and at home, and in order

for both to happen collaboration needs to occur effectively between the two. It has already been

established that collaboration can have profound impacts on a student's success, especially for

students who are struggling at the secondary level, or who are at risk of not completing high

school.

Effective collaboration is vital in the process of getting a student to complete secondary

education. Effective forms of this collaboration can take the form of Committee of Special

Education (CSE) meetings, frequent communication with families expressing student success

and concern, and meaningfully collaborating with mentor teachers and other school

professionals. In my experience I have been fortunate enough to see this type of collaboration
and communication occur. I have seen how essential positive communication is with parents and

guardians. It is beneficial for educators to communicate positive achievements with parents for

two reasons. This improves parents' feelings regarding their students' success, and this type of

communication also makes it far easier for teachers to communicate when problems do arise

with a student. This is because there has been a positive and effective line of communication

already established. Collaboration between educators and all stakeholders is necessary for

student success.

Final Reflection

Professional development is a term that is used very often in a school setting among

educators and administrators. This term holds many connotations; however, professional

development is most meaningful when each educator is able to define what that term means for

them and able to identify their own weaknesses or gaps in knowledge. Professional development

is about effective collaboration with other members of schools and school communities. Not only

does this benefit the students and their learning, but it also benefits students in terms of their own

collaboration as they are able to see this behavior modeled for them. At the secondary level

seeing this collaboration and participating in this effective collaboration allows students to be

better prepared for life after high school.

Continued education is equally as important for educators due to the vast amounts of

research being done in education and because of the ever changing climate surrounding

education in terms of both national and local politics. The best educators continue their learning

for both the benefits of themselves and the benefits of their students. These educators have a

strong commitment to teaching with empathy and understanding in order to ensure the success of
all students. In my future career I will be dedicated to both professional development, especially

in the form of collaboration, and continued learning as this will help ensure I am preparing

students for life after the secondary level. I plan to do this by communicating frequently with

educational teams and members of the students' lives, as well as through self driven learning in

the form of both formal education and personal research.

 Sources

Brandisauskiene, A., Cesnaviciene, J., Miciuliene, R., & Kaminskiene, L. (2020). What Factors

Matter for the Sustainable Professional Development of Teachers? Analysis from Four

Countries. Journal of Teacher Education for Sustainability, 22(2), 153–170.

https://doi.org/10.2478/jtes-2020-0022

Gerdes, J., Goei, S. L., Huizinga, M., & De Ruyter, D. J. (2022). True partners? Exploring

family-school partnership in secondary education from a collaboration perspective.

Educational Review, 74(4), 805–823. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2020.1778643

Hatch, E., Villagrana, K., Wu, Q., Lawler, S., & Ferguson, K. (2022). Predictors of Secondary

Completion Among Homeless Youth in Three U.S. Cities and the Potential Application

of National Policies. Child & Adolescent Social Work Journal, 39(3), 347–359.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10560-022-00826-8

Mullins Jr., R., Williams, T., Hicks, D., & Brooke Mullins, S. (2020). Can we meet our mission?

Examining the professional development of social studies teachers to support students

with disabilities and emergent bilingual learners. Journal of Social Studies Research,

44(1), 195–208. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jssr.2019.01.004