Supporting professional learning communities
Channel: VVOB South Africa
Date: 19/08/2019

A range of stakeholders can provide support, external input and advice to make a PLC thrive. School management can encourage teachers to engage in PLCs. They can create the necessary conditions for PLCs to take place, ranging from realizing a safe environment in which critical reflection can take place, to allocating time and providing resources. PLC members identify support from their principals and school management as critical to success.
Experts such as education officials, university staff, representatives of private sector institutions or non-governmental organizations and teachers with a particular expertise can be invited based on the needs of the PLC. Staff from special schools and full service schools can also provide access to expertise. In the absence of external input, PLC members have been found to focus on practices they already consider ‘good’ rather than looking for new approaches.