Table 5
Shares of teachers who reported participating in various professional development activities in the past 12 months, by type and by subject, in all schools and in low- and high-poverty schools
| All | Low-poverty | High-poverty | Gap (high- minus low-poverty) |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Four standard types of professional development | ||||
| Workshops, conferences, or training sessions (teacher is not the presenter) | ||||
| Yes | 91.9% | 90.8% | 92.7% | 1.9 ppt. |
| No | 8.10% | 9.20% | 7.3% | -1.9 ppt. |
| University courses related to teaching | ||||
| Yes | 26.6% | 27.5% | 25.3% | -2.2 ppt. |
| No | 73.4% | 72.5% | 74.7% | 2.2 ppt. |
| Workshops, conferences, or training sessions (teacher is the presenter) | ||||
| Yes | 23.1% | 23.4% | 23.0% | -0.4 ppt. |
| No | 76.9% | 76.6% | 77.0% | 0.4 ppt. |
| Observational visits to other schools | ||||
| Yes | 21.6% | 22.5% | 20.9% | -1.6 ppt. |
| No | 78.4% | 77.5% | 79.1% | 1.6 ppt. |
| Any type of professional development focused on a specific area (content or subject) | ||||
| Content of the subject(s) they teach | ||||
| Yes | 85.1% | 84.0% | 86.4% | 2.4 ppt. |
| No | 14.9% | 16.0% | 13.6% | -2.4 ppt. |
| Use of computers for instruction | ||||
| Yes | 67.7% | 70.4% | 66.8% | -3.6 ppt. |
| No | 32.3% | 29.6% | 33.2% | 3.6 ppt. |
| Reading instruction | ||||
| Yes | 57.0% | 51.7% | 61.1% | 9.4 ppt. |
| No | 43.0% | 48.3% | 38.9% | -9.4 ppt. |
| Student discipline and management in the classroom | ||||
| Yes | 42.3% | 35.7% | 47.2% | 11.5 ppt. |
| No | 57.7% | 64.3% | 52.8% | -11.5 ppt. |
| Teaching students with disabilities | ||||
| Yes | 37.2% | 36.6% | 38.3% | 1.7 ppt. |
| No | 62.8% | 63.4% | 61.7% | -1.7 ppt. |
| Teaching English language learners (ELLs) | ||||
| Yes | 26.7% | 19.3% | 33.6% | 14.2 ppt. |
| No | 73.3% | 80.7% | 66.5% | -14.2 ppt. |
| Other activities that offer professional development opportunities | ||||
| Engage in research on a topic of interest to them professionally | ||||
| Yes | 45.1% | 49.5% | 42.7% | -6.8 ppt. |
| No | 54.9% | 50.5% | 57.3% | 6.8 ppt. |
| Participate in regularly scheduled collaboration with other teachers on issues of instruction (excluding administrative meetings) | ||||
| Yes | 80.8% | 81.2% | 81.1% | -0.1 ppt. |
| No | 19.2% | 18.8% | 18.9% | 0.1 ppt. |
| Observe, or be observed by, other teachers in the classroom | ||||
| Yes | 67.0% | 65.8% | 68.7% | 2.9 ppt. |
| No | 33.0% | 34.2% | 31.3% | -2.9 ppt. |
Notes: Data are for teachers in public noncharter schools. Teachers were asked, “In the past 12 months, have you participated in any of the following professional development activities?” For “other activities,” teachers were asked, “In the past 12 months, did you do any of the following?”
Source: 2011–2012 Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) microdata from the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)
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