Professional development for educators
Professional development is an essential way for teachers to refine their strategies, methods, and understanding of their work. In order to provide educators with the tools they need, a professional development marketplace (also known simply as “PD”) has developed around online and offline tools created for teacher education.
This list is a guide to the major and minor players in the field of PD. Our analysis of each competitor shows that the School Improvement Network’s PD 360 has the most training tools and videos in the industry, and is also one of the cheapest. Teachers can purchase individual PD 360 licenses for $ 125, but the most economical method is to purchase an entire school or district license, which often drives the price below $ 100 per license.
Each school and district must determine what its needs are and what is most effective. We hope we have been as open and objective as possible in the following review.
PD 360 – School Improvement Network
PD 360 has over 1,500 videos, training from 120 experts, 97 topics, a community of 700,000, new content added daily, and a year of full access costs about $ 100 or less per teacher. The platform also integrates with an observation tool equipped with prescriptive technology, Common Core Standards training, and a unique product for Title I schools. The PD 360 community is closed to the public.
Advantages: You get the most bang for your buck. The entire PD 360 platform costs less per teacher than a course from any of the competitors.
Cons: The platform is currently built in Flash.
Bottom line: School Improvement Network provides a true feat that is unstoppably efficient and profitable.
EdWeb
EdWeb has a K12 educator store that sells e-books and teacher support materials, but it is not presented as a focused resource for teacher improvement. The store and its products are open and available to anyone, although the main product appears to be the online teacher community. The number of users is not published.
Advantages: EdWeb sends weekly emails to help subscribers stay up-to-date.
Cons: The community is open access, which means you don’t have to be a teacher to participate in the forums. The user interface is very difficult to navigate and the participation in the community is small.
Bottom line: the EdWeb site only provides forum capabilities; no professional development connects to the community. EdWeb sends helpful emails, but the community is difficult to navigate.
Schoolnet
Schoolnet focuses on improving education through data analysis and is positioned as “the leader in data-driven education for K-12 school systems.” They have an open access community and their website seems to offer on-demand professional development solutions. The number of experts, users and community participants is not published. Pearson Education purchased Schoolnet in April 2011.
Pros: Pearson Education will likely be able to expand Schoolnet resources.
Cons: The community is open access. Their products are not a complete whole.
Bottom line: Schoolnet offers free resources on its website to help educators as much as possible. They have tools connected to their community, and Pearson Education will probably be able to expand the Schoolnet resources.
Edutopia
Edutopia is supported by the George Lucas Educational Foundation. Edutopia offers 150 free videos of an average of four minutes each, a community of over 100,000 members, and other free resources for educational professional development. The community is open access, so the public can and does participate in the forums.
Advantages: The free materials are of high quality and the community has good participation.
Cons: Materials and resources are limited, the community is open to the public, and the community is relatively small.
Bottom line: Edutopia may be one of the best free resources available to teachers, but the resources are very limited.
SimpleK12
SimpleK12 offers a community as the main professional development solution. The community does not have free registration as all other communities have in this competitive analysis; a registration fee of $ 297 per year will give one person access to the community. SimpleK12 claims to serve 500,000 worldwide and offer 500 hours of classroom technology instructional videos about the community.
Advantages: If the community serves 500,000, then there could be a good turnout.
Cons: There is no way to test the product without buying it and it is quite expensive.
Bottom line: SimpleK12 is expensive and veiled.
Knowledge delivery systems
Knowledge Delivery Systems (KDS) has eClassroom, mVal, eWalk, and custom professional development programs for some of its top products. KDS does not provide a community, but it does provide a way for educators who follow the same course to communicate with each other. The eClassroom product is the platform where educators follow courses that they buy one at a time. The mVal product is an assessment tool and eWalk is a classroom walkthrough tool. KDS offers approximately 760 hours of training videos from 55 experts.
Pros: Educators have up to 760 hours of content to choose from and assessment tools that work effectively.
Cons: Observation and assessment tools are not integrated with a professional development platform, KDS does not offer community, and districts and teachers purchase one course at a time.
Bottom line: KDS primarily offers specialized courses from which educators can earn college credit, but they are not intended to be a district-wide solution.
Teachscape
Teachscape offers courses that a school or district must purchase one at a time. They offer 108 courses from 12 experts as of July 2011. Teachscape’s feat it’s the 360 degree camera technology they employ with their classroom observation deck.
Advantages: Teachscape has a 360 degree camera for its observation technology.
Cons: Teachscape Professional Development, like many other companies in the industry, is only available one course at a time with only twelve experts. They also don’t offer an online professional learning community.
Bottom line: Teachscape offers extensive training and any training should be universally applied.
ASCD
ASCD is a nonprofit organization serving 160,000 educators in 148 countries with a myriad of products. ASCD offers various levels of membership, from a $ 25 student membership to a $ 219 premium membership (as of July 2011). ASCD offers several professional development solutions, including PD in Focus, a professional development platform with 90 hours of video and 49 experts. The community is theoretically open to all, but the group facilitator must approve each member.
Advantages: ASCD has many resources at its disposal, which means that users have the opportunity to access many resources in one place.
Cons: Resources are scarce and actual professional development training is minimal with only 90 hours, 55 hours and a small community.
Bottom line: ASCD is affordable due to its membership breakdown. There are good resources, but those resources are scarce.
PBS Teacher Line
PBS Teacherline offers 130 graduate courses for teachers. They recently added Peer Connection, their own online community. Courses and trainings are available one at a time and separate licenses are purchased for each user.
Pros: The number of graduate courses available is tempting for anyone looking to advance in school during their career.
Cons: The community is not free and educators must pay for each resource they use instead of having an open library. Licensing makes providing specific training to multiple educators a logistical challenge.
Bottom line: PBS Teacherline is a good option if educators want to work toward a higher degree.
Learner.org
The Annenberg Foundation has created Learner.org to provide free educational resources online. Learner.org has great resources for the average student, but the site is not designed for professional development at the district or school level.
Advantages: Everything is quality and everything is free.
Cons: Learner.org is not a viable resource for specific training as its PD content is limited.
Bottom line: Learner.org is the professional learner’s dream, but it is not a training source for classroom management or teaching techniques.
Staff development for educators
Staff Development for Educators (SDE) coordinates traditional and online professional development. SDE does not provide a community to collaborate on, and online courses are only available with individual licenses. Educators can choose any of 54 courses to purchase and follow online.
Advantages: It is simple and straightforward: each teacher buys a course and completes it.
Cons: SDE doesn’t provide a library, community, or true professional development platform.
Bottom line: SDE started out as a traditional professional development company and they have retained that model even in their online endeavors.
Please feel free to comment on things we might have overlooked, the companies you have seen or used, and your honest and respectful opinion of what has worked for you.