Adventures in Professional Development

Everybody does it, nobody likes it, and it's hard to know if it works. What's going on?

The State of Things

According to TNTP’s 2015 report, “The Mirage,” the largest 50 school districts in the U.S. were (as of 2011-2012) devoting at least $8 billion annually to teacher professional development. More recent data from the National Center for Education Statistics seems to confirm this figure, showing that public schools spend about 1% of thei…