During the other years, the teacher develops a multi-year, substantive professional development plan and makes annual adjustments based on analysis of student data and school improvement plans. This program provides for increasing autonomy for the majority of high performing teachers throughout their teaching careers. The professional development options and strategies offered in the cycles provide teachers with more contact with colleagues, more feedback and analysis of their teaching, and more support for their professional development plans. Collaboration can include, but is not limited to, study groups, grade-level meetings, team teaching, action research, and teacher exchange. Teachers select an identified objective to study that will contribute to a school or classroom goal to increase student results.
Individual experiences can include activities such as taking a course or doing action research.
Teams of teachers select a topic of study of the impact of teaching strategies on learning and then measure the difference in student results. Teachers engage in a number of observations with peers during the year in pursuit of an instructional objective. Teachers have the opportunity to confer with colleagues about the observation of specific classroom practices or their teaching in general. Future efforts will develop and expand existing opportunities and identify new ones. The cycles create a framework for focusing the various activities on the achievement of MCPS and local school goals in order to improve student results.