schools
february2
2017
11
Schools Update: Professional Development
By Aaron Miller
When parents and community
members see Professional Development
(PD) on the school calendar, they often
wonder what it is that these teachers
are doing while their students are at
home. The fact of the matter is that on
these days teachers are truly working
to develop their professional skills to
enhance what they are doing in the
classroom to impact student learning.
Professional development can
take many forms. Teachers often have
opportunities to attend trainings and
workshops outside of the district, they
work on book studies where they are
collaboratively working on a skill or
program that is focused on within a
given text, or they are planning lessons
collaboratively to implement state stan-
dards and other effective instructional
methods that they have learned during
past professional development.
This year teachers in the
Vernonia School District are working on
two specifi c initiatives that are already
bearing fruit in the classroom with their
students.
Teachers at Vernonia Elemen-
tary, Mist Grade and Vernonia Middle
Schools are working on the Oregon
Formative Assessment for Students and
Teachers (OFAST) grant. OFAST pro-
vides funding for teachers’ time to go
through a 5-module course on improving
formative assessment techniques. Teach-
ers are working hard to implement these
strategies that really focus on providing
strong feedback to students on their cur-
rent level of performance, and the future
progress needed to meet learning targets
and success criteria on each lesson and
unit of study. In addition to focusing on
the effectiveness of the teacher’s feed-
back to students, this grant is also train-
ing teachers to involve students more ef-
fectively in providing feedback to each
other on their progress toward the suc-
cess criteria of each lesson and unit.
Teachers at Vernonia High
School are working on an Advancement
Via Individual Determination (AVID)
grant. Through this work teachers
are working to implement “proven
instructional
methodologies
and
content area best practices to improve
outcomes for all students.” AVID’s
intense curriculum is designed to create
and foster a “college-going culture that
increases the number of students who
enroll and succeed in higher education
and their lives beyond.”
While OFAST and AVID are
the primary focus of our professional
development time this school year, there
are always other initiatives and tasks
that require teacher work time outside of
their regular day with students.
Professional Development has
been increasingly tougher the last two
years as our budget has been cut and
teachers voluntarily gave up some of this
valuable time in order to increase the
“Project Based Learning” Class
Makes Presentation continued from page 9
Pioneer Museum and the Vernonia
Grange, Betsy Miller with the Vernonia
Area Chamber of Commerce and the
Friends of Stub Stewart State Park,
Aaron Miller representing the Vernonia
Lions Club, Dean Smith with the
Vernonia Rural Fire Protection District
and the Vernonia Volunteer Ambulance
Association, and Bill Langmaid
representing Vernonia Hands on Art, the
Upper Nehalem Watershed Council and
the Vernonia Education Foundation.
Grant applications are due in
February and students will assess the
applications and award grants before the
end of the school year.
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number of student contact days in our
calendar. The amount of time spent on
PD has steadily decreased the last three
years due to budget constraints, and this
element of our work is defi nitely in need
of more time.
Because planning, preparing,
correcting and developing their
professional skills are items that can’t be
done effectively when staff are working
with students, most teachers work
signifi cantly longer each day than they
are paid for. While teachers get paid for
an 8-hour day, they very typically work
at least 1 ½ - 3 additional hours each day
in order to take care of those additional
tasks. More PD time is needed, and
a boost in our budget is a remedy that
would provide even more contact hours
with students, as well as more hours to
collaborate and prepare so we can be as
effective as possible when working with
those students.
Next time there is a day off of
school and you are wondering what
those teachers are doing without their
students, please know that they are
continuing to work hard for them, just
in a different way that will allow them
to be even more effective at helping kids
learn.
Vernonia Students of the Month
December 2016
Nova Gleason
Grade 2
Nova is a very focused worker and a very willing
helper in her classroom at school. She follows
directions and is responsible, respectful and safe.
Her favorite subject in school is math. She played
soccer this summer. She also enjoys painting.
Megan Zavales
Grade 6
Megan’s teachers say she takes initiative with
her work in school and is also very thorough.
She is known as being kind and compassionate
towards others and always has a great attitude.
Megan says her favorite subject is math. She
plays basketball on the Middle School team as
well as a tournament team.
Cassidy Whitton
Grade 12
Cassidy is very active in school. She played
varsity volleyball and will play on the varsity
softball team. She also does stats for the basket-
ball team. She is the Vice President of the Student
Body and is involved in the Project Based Learning
Class. She was also involved with the Forestry
Team in the past. She says her favorite subject is
history. Next year she plans to duel enroll at OSU
and Linn-Benton Community College to study
Business, and then possibly go to law school.
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