In this paper, we present details of a partnership undertaken by four universities with field-based, alternative STEM teacher preparation programs and a large urban school district to provide ongoing professional support for teachers serving as mentors for individuals preparing for careers in highpoverty schools. We also present key findings related to our implementation of an educative mentoring professional learning community (PLC) as a professional development (PD) model for these mentors. Our analysis reveals that mentors as well as candidates identified the PD program as addressing their specific interests and concerns, and that they were regularly and deeply engaged with key activities that were part of each session's agenda. These findings signal how key elements of PD workshops can contribute to creating and sustaining a local but replicable PLC utilizing an educative mentoring model to support mentors and the future teachers whom they support.

We were pleased read the response our Journal of Teacher Education (JTE) article (Fishman et al., 2013) by Moon, Passmore, Reiser, and Michaels (2013). We believe that Moon et al. have properly identified both the value in our study and the importance of moving beyond not only our study, but similar studies, better serve the urgent need for professional development (PD) designs that are effective in helping teachers successfully enact curricular reforms, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS; Wilson, 2013) and the Common Core State Standards in mathematics and English language arts (Common Core State Standards Initiative, 2010; Porter, McMaken, Hwang, & Yang, 2011). We agree wholeheartedly that the field would benefit from scholarship that leads research-based design principles guide the ongoing development, implementation, and evaluation efforts in online (Moon et al., p. 1). Below, we briefly recap our study and address the issues raised by Moon et al. in their commentary. We then expand on the ideas introduced by Moon et al. for how take advantage of the opportunity for studying teacher learning related the NGSS presented by the Next Generation Science Exemplar System (NGSX) PD platform. The heart of our study was the experimental of PD delivered in two different media. Our study was a comparison study, the value of which has been hotly debated in the field of educational technology (Clark, 1983, 1994; Kozma, 1994). We worked make the two conditions in our study balanced with respect opportunities learn, while not limiting the natural affordances offered by each medium. Random assignment ensured that the teachers in each condition had equivalent characteristics. Our focus was on addressing the ongoing policy debate about how invest in teacher PD and whether the imagined risks of online PD outweigh suggested benefits. We thus do not address the call by Dede, Ketelhut, Whitehouse, and McCloskey (2009) for a focus on theory building articulate design principles. Perhaps most importantly, we designed our study address a conceptual framework for studying PD that links the features of the PD changes in teachers' knowledge and beliefs, changes in classroom practice, and changes in student learning outcomes (Desimone, 2009). Student learning might be the most policy-relevant area for study in relation PD, and yet is perhaps the least studied, in large part because it is so difficult identify common student learning outcomes and measures related the PD. We were opportunistic in this respect, building our study around the adoption of a new environmental science curriculum (Edelson et al., 2005). This curriculum represented challenging inquiry-based science (Crawford, 2000), with many new techniques and tools be learned, and our PD would be teachers' primary information source for learning how use the new materials. Best of all, because everyone in the study was using a single curriculum, we had a common measure of learning in the curriculum-aligned test. We observed significant growth in teacher self-efficacy, classroom practice, and student learning in both conditions, but difference between conditions. This finding was welcomed by many as a sign that it is safe employ online PD, in light of concerns about what might be given up by districts in with face-to-face PD (e.g., Herold, 2013). In our article, we were somewhat more conservative in our conclusions, observing that a finding of no significant differences indicates that we can be less concerned with media effects than with the specific needs and demands of particular contexts in which PD is needed. We absolutely agree with Moon et al. (2013) when they state that to take [our] findings as applicable all online PD would be an overreach (p. 2). In fact, we were careful make the same argument ourselves and appreciate the chance highlight this, given its importance. …

This study employed a randomized experiment to examine differences in teacher and student learning from professional development (PD) in two modalities: online and face-to-face. The study explores whether there are differences in teacher knowledge and beliefs, teacher classroom practice, and student learning outcomes related to PD modality. Comparison of classroom practice and student learning outcomes, normally difficult to establish in PD research, is facilitated by the use of a common set of curriculum materials as the content for PD and subsequent teaching. Findings indicate that teachers and students exhibited significant gains in both conditions, and that there was no significant difference between conditions. We discuss implications for the delivery of teacher professional learning.

As teacher professional development research includes more experimental designs, new challenges arise. We examine the threat of participant attrition as an example of the types of problems researchers face. Counter-intuitively, higher levels of recruitment effort were related to higher dropout rates among teachers. We also found that teachers left because of changes in teaching assignments, institutional challenges, and personal challenges. Finally, the majority of teachers in urban schools dropped out, while the majority of teachers in rural or suburban schools remained. We conclude with recommendations for future teacher learning experiments.

Physics Education Research is a form of social science research in that it uses human subjects. As physicists we need to be aware of the ethical and legal ramifications of performing this research, taking into account the fundamental differences between working with substances and working with people. For several decades, the federal government has regulated research involving human subjects. With current procedures, a proposal soliciting federal funds for a research project involving human subjects will be flagged by the applicants institution and checked for compliance with appropriate regulations. However, there is a large body of Physics Education Research that is not federally funded and thus may not be flagged. Nevertheless, there are ethical standards that apply to this research. This paper outlines the preliminary considerations for conducting such research.

Learning Sciences researchers have a tradition of developing inquiry-oriented and technology-rich curriculum materials, often in the context of design-based research on learning. But what becomes of the materials developed after the research is completed? A key challenge for the Learning Sciences is to address the issue of sustainability for the materials we develop. Professional development (PD) can help teachers make adaptations to the written curriculum while maintaining its integrity. We examine empirical data from a study of PD in the context of inquiry-oriented curricular reform to show how PD aligned with written curriculum and informed by enacted curriculum can influence teachers' practice in ways that are consistent with the goals of the curriculum designers. We conclude with a model for PD design informed both by the written and enacted curriculum to facilitate teacher planning that allows for adaptations that maintain fidelity to the curriculum design.

One of the most difficult challenges in research on teacher learning is identifying and documenting linkages between teacher learning, classroom practice, and student learning (Loucks-Horsley & Matsumoto, 1999; Wilson & Berne, 1999). Demonstrating convincing evidence of this proposed linkage is important, especially in a policy climate that emphasizes accountability in terms of student test performance (e.g., U.S. Department of Education, 2001). The development of rigorous academic standards (e.g., American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1993) and an increased emphasis on systemic reform (Smith & O'Day, 1991) as a means of fostering educational change pre-date the current accountability emphasis, but operate in combination with accountability to create a greater demand for high-quality teachers of science. Professional development is frequently cited as the cornerstone of any reform effort that hopes to create systemic changes leading to improved student performance on academic standards (Committee on Science and Mathematics Teacher Preparation, 2001), and many recent funding efforts have sought to focus attention on teacher learning and its role in fostering improved student learning.

The national dialogue on science education includes two themes. The first is the call for standards based reforms in education expressed both by the American Association for the The second is the call for greater accountability for student learning on a multitude of levels, as exemplified in the " No Child Left Behind Act " (U.S. Department of Education, 2002). One response to such demands is to increase teacher professional development in the hope of enabling the teacher to teach that deemed necessary, while holding the teachers accountable when they fail to do so. Despite the fact that the national spotlight is focused on teacher instruction and student learning, little research has been done linking teacher learning in professional development directly to student learning Highly Interactive Computing in Education (hi-ce) we developed a design approach to professional development that affords us the opportunity to address the key question of teacher learning from professional development and its link to evidence of student learning. Our method illustrates the interdependence between the study and implementation of professional development and its impact in the classroom. In this paper we use variations of our design approach for professional development as a template to examine professional development and the resulting learning, examining its usefulness both as an evaluative as well as a diagnostic tool in professional development design. We evaluate professional development through analyzing the workshop enactments and post-workshop interviews with teachers to identify the content and strategies used and the expressed impact on the teacher learning. Next we apply our design approach to professional development to two different classroom investigations. Through these case analyses we demonstrate both the diagnostic and evaluative nature of our design cycle for professional development. Our investigation examines teachers' " knowing that, " as measured through teachers' expressed learning from professional development, and " knowing how, " as witnessed in classroom observations. As Ryle (1949) has suggested, " knowing that " and " knowing how " are not only different, but distinct ways of knowing. Teachers' " knowing how " manifests itself in action which we observe and we measure the professional development's success or failure by investigating resulting student achievement. However, investigating the " knowing how " aspect of teacher learning is time consuming and labor intensive. By analyzing the workshops and teachers reported learning from the workshops " know that " , we create a sketch of the professional …

With the proliferation of educational reform policies and strategies, the need for high quality professional development (PD) has emerged as one of the most important areas for research in education, particularly in determining the relationship between PD and student learning outcomes (Borko, 2004). Although research has begun to focus on the defining characteristics of quality PD, little has been done to examine the specific factors involved in teacher learning from PD and its relationship to practice and student learning Teachers are influenced both by professional development and through reflecting on their own classroom practice (however informally), including evidence of their students' learning. While professional development is frequently designed to inform classroom practice, classroom practice is often the major influence on teacher learning related to the professional development. Professional development is intended to mediate teachers' practice; however the practice itself often becomes a mediating factor in how the professional development continues to impact the teacher. The sustainability of reform initiatives relies on teachers maintaining alignment with the intent of the initiative, even as they make adaptations to suit their local context. Thus understanding the relationship between teacher learning from professional development and the resulting practice is an important area for study. The purpose of this study is to examine the question: How does professional development impact teacher learning in the context of classroom practice? Background – What do we know about quality PD?