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The National Staff Development Council (NSDC) just released a report reviewing the the status of teacher professional development in the United States. Their conclusion: We're making incremental progress in teacher induction and mentoring programs, but we lag woefully behind other nations in providing the kinds of professional development that improve student learning.

Surveys of teachers reveal that disjointed, one-time, "drive-by" professional development workshops remain the norm for large majorities of American teachers. This, despite strong research demonstrating the benefits of intensive, on-going professional development that is tied closely to teacher practice, focuses on student learning, supports school improvement priorities and forges strong working relationships among teachers. NSDC's findings could have profound implications for how schools allocate teachers' time and structure the school day.

The report describes the striking differences between teacher professional development practices here and abroad. NSDC's press release sums up these differences:

The United States is far behind [other nations] in providing public school teachers with opportunities to participate in extended learning opportunities and productive collaborative communities. Those opportunities allow teachers to work together on instructional planning, learn from one another through mentoring or peer coaching, conduct research on the outcomes of classroom practices, and collectively guide curriculum, assessment, and professional learning decisions.

Teachers in the Netherlands, Singapore and Sweden enjoy three to five times as much time for planning as U.S. teachers do. They can share wisdom, learn from one another's practice, and collaborate on effective instructional strategies.

Education commentators have used international comparisons of student performance to support all manner of education reform strategies--both good and bad--that have little to do with teaching and learning. The NSDC report reminds us that any reform strategy should include measures to help educators succeed in the classroom .

There's much more to the NSDC report than I could possibly describe here, so be sure to check it out. This report is the first step in a multi-year effort NSDC executive director Stephanie Hirsh calls "the most comprehensive attempt to measure and monitor what states and districts are doing in professional learning to improve quality and results."