Degree Name

EdD (Doctor of Education)

Program

Educational Leadership

Date of Award

8-2011

Committee Chair or Co-Chairs

Virginia P. Foley

Committee Members

Donald W. Good, Elizabeth Ralston, Eric S. Glover

Abstract

This study was designed for the purpose of quantitatively examining the perceptions of northeast Tennessee principals as they compared their system's professional development plans to Learning Forward's, formerly the National Staff Development Council, recently revised definition of professional development. The theoretical frameworks for this study lay in the recent works of Schlechty (2009) on transforming schools into learning organizations, and Senge (2006), who provided the essential principles of learning organizations.

Data were collected from 124 principals in 19 school systems in northeast Tennessee, using a 4-point Internet based survey created by Learning Forward to evaluate perceptions of how well professional development programs address the individual components of Learning Forward's revised definition of professional development.

Findings included no statistical significance between the size of the school and perception of how comprehensive, sustained, and intensive the professional development plan was or the method used to implement the professional development plan. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the perceptions of comprehensive, sustained, and intensive professional development and the method used to implement the professional development plan. Elementary school principals believed that their professional development plans were more comprehensive, sustained, and intensive than did their secondary school principal colleagues. However, there was no significant difference between their perceptions of methods for implementing professional development plans.

Document Type

Dissertation - unrestricted

Copyright

Copyright by the authors.

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