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Case Analysis

This document discusses using professional learning communities (PLCs) to improve minority student success in science. It provides background on the local community, school district, and Anderson High School. The school has a diverse student body but sees achievement gaps. The document proposes that PLCs, with a focus on collaboration and data analysis, can help teachers address these gaps by ensuring all students learn. It describes key aspects of effective PLC implementation, including establishing shared values and goals. Administrators believe PLCs have already helped increase the number of students achieving advanced scores on state science exams.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
158 views21 pages

Case Analysis

This document discusses using professional learning communities (PLCs) to improve minority student success in science. It provides background on the local community, school district, and Anderson High School. The school has a diverse student body but sees achievement gaps. The document proposes that PLCs, with a focus on collaboration and data analysis, can help teachers address these gaps by ensuring all students learn. It describes key aspects of effective PLC implementation, including establishing shared values and goals. Administrators believe PLCs have already helped increase the number of students achieving advanced scores on state science exams.

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api-339789713
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 1

Improving Minority Student Success in Science with Professional Learning Communities

Todd Anderson

University of North Texas

EDLE5630
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 2

Improving Minority Student Success in Science with Professional Learning Communities

With the advent of high-stakes testing and school accountability following the passage of

the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2001 and the follow-on Every Student Succeeds Act

(ESSA) in 2015, public school administrators must ensure that all students, regardless of

educational category, show marked improvement. Of course, this means that administrators and

teacher-leaders must parse multiple data points in an effort to understand how students are doing.

Under the current accountability model, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) disaggregates

student data by subject, grade, and student groups (TEA.gov).

With this disaggregation of data comes the responsibility to understand how student

groups perform year to year on the Texas State Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR)

exams, administered yearly to students throughout the state of Texas. This, of course, creates an

issue for leadership: How to identify trends in data, determine what the trends mean, and apply

sound choices to drive decision making in schools. Ronka, Lachat, Slaughter, & Meltzer (2008)

state, Despite the increased amounts of data available, many educators still feel ill prepared to

analyze and use their school data effectively. They are data rich, but information poor (p. 18).

In other words, administrators and teacher-leaders must understand how to use the data that they

have in order to inform decisions for improving instruction and student outcomes on campus.

Within the realm of science, biology is the tested subjected under the STAAR program, with the

vast majority of freshmen on high school campuses taking the STAAR examination every May.

Background Information

Community
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 3

The community of Anderson City has a population of 8,024 residents and has portions

lying within Denton and Tarrant Counties in North Texas. The community is a wealthy suburb,

as the median household income of the city exceeds $115,000, with only 0.4% of the population

of the community considered to be below the poverty line.

District

Anderson School District (ASD), located in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) area, is a 234

square mile district spanning Tarrant, Denton, and Wise counties. The district contains fourteen

municipalities, operating seventeen elementary schools, five middle schools, three

comprehensive high schools, and one accelerated high school. The district serves over 21,000

students and is one of the DFW areas most rapidly growing districts, with growth fueled through

active housing development, retail, and business industries in the immediate area. The district

sees growth at a rate of 1,200 students per year.

Anderson School District believes the kids come first, continuous improvement is

essential for future success, and that the success of each student is the shared responsibility of

students, families, schools, and communities. ASD seeks to be the best and most sought-after

school district where every student is ready for college, ready for the global workplace, and

ready for personal success. This guides the districts mission: In partnership with parents and the

community, Anderson School District will engage all students in a premier education, preparing

them to be successful, productive citizens.

School Information

Anderson High School (AHS) in Anderson, Texas, is a large comprehensive high school

in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area that served 2,557 students during the 2015-2016
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 4

school year. The school has a robust Advanced Placement/Dual Credit program, with 71.5% of

11th and 12th grade students completing an advanced level course. When considering all grades,

48.5% of students at AHS take at least one advanced level course. 87.4% of the graduates at

AHS were labeled as College and Career Ready Graduates during the 2014-2015 school year.

Student Demographics

The 2,557 students at AHS represent a diverse ethnic distribution. This ethnic

distribution breaks down to 65.5% white, 18.3% Hispanic, 8.6% African American, 4.5% Asian,

0.9% Native American, 0.2% Pacific Islander, and 0.1% of students identified as two or more

races. At Anderson High School, only 12.4% of students (approximately 317 students) are

identified as economically disadvantaged compared to the Texas state average of 59%.

Additionally, 1.4% of students at Anderson High School are English Language Learners (ELL)

and nearly 23% (576 students) listed as At-Risk. The school has a mobility rate of 8.6%, a little

less than half the mobility rate of the state of Texas (16.5%).

Staff Demographics

AHS has 182.5 total staff members, of which 171.8 constitute professional staff. Of

those 171.8 professional staff members, 146.7 are teachers, 18 are professional support staff, and

7.1 occupy campus administrative positions. 21.5 staff members are minority, representing only

11.8% of the total staff. This pales in comparison to the state average of 48.2% minority staff

members. The vast majority of staff, 89%, are Caucasian, with 7.6% of staff identifying as

Hispanic and the remaining distribution between African-American and Asian staff members. In

contrast to the State of Texas, where only 23.5% of staff members are male, Anderson High

School employees 73.0 male teachers and 73.7 female teachers, representing 49.2% and 50.8%
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 5

of staff respectively. 67.5% of staff hold bachelor degrees, with 32.5% holding masters degrees.

No teacher holds a doctorate degree at Anderson High School.

AHS has a diverse range of experience on its staff, with 1.9% of teachers being new, and

the vast majority holding between 5 and 20 years of experience.

Framework

One effective method that school leaders can incorporate in their drive to understand data

is the Professional Learning Community (PLC). The PLC is a community of teachers working in

collective efficacy to improve student outcomes. One way that the PLC accomplishes this is

with collaboration. Wilson (2016) states, Professional learning communities facilitate teacher

leadership by allowing teachers to collaborate on their professional work, analyze student data,

and assess student learning (p. 48). By collaborating as a learning community, teachers can tap

into the collective strength of the group and work with leadership to understand where students

were, where they currently stand based off current assessment data, and where the students will

be when assessed on the state STAAR examination.

Establishing this type of learning community is not as simple as stating that a group of

teachers is a professional learning community. Indeed, AllThingsPLC (n.d.) states, the term has

become so commonplace and has been used so ambiguously to describe virtually any loose

coupling of individuals who share a common interest in education that it is in danger of losing all

meaning (AllThingsPLC, para. 1). Through instructional leadership, the principal and the

leadership team can ensure the proper implementation of PLCs as a means to analyze the reams

of data that now flood the public school system. According to Dufour (2004), When a school

begins to function as a professional learning community, however, teachers become aware of the
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 6

incongruity between their commitment to ensure learning for all students and their lack of a

coordinated strategy to respond when some students do not learn (p. 8).

In order to ensure that teachers in the school form a professional learning community,

research shows that the school administrator must focus on a four-step process: Creating a

mission statement, developing a vision, developing value statements, and establishing goals

(DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, 2009; DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, & Many, 2007; DuFour & Eaker, 1998;

DuFour, Eaker, & DuFour, 2006). While the school administrator may focus this on the larger

professional learning community that exists within the school building, individual communities,

such as the Biology PLC, can utilize this research to focus efforts at the outset by developing

their own core set of beliefs, to include their shared mission, vision, values, and goals for the

upcoming school year. These sets of beliefs serve as the guide for all work conducted within the

community during the school year, with the community continuously referring back to these

principles throughout the year.

Administrators at Anderson High School believe that the PLC is a means to which

teachers can collaborate and contribute as a collective group to increase student outcomes to

ensure that all students meet the stated goals of the district and reach their fullest potential. Over

the last couple of years, the school has seen a marked increase in the number of students

achieving Level III (Advanced) recognition on the STAAR Biology exam. This increase can be

attributed to the PLC culture that exists on the campus, as teachers have set aside personal goals

to work in collective efficacy to increase student outcomes. As a tested subject under STAAR

program, biology receives significant focus and resources in terms of both dollars and attention

from administrators. A concerted effort is underway on Andersons campus to implement and


Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 7

utilize the PLC culture as a means to increase student outcomes across disciplines through the

collective efficacy of the individual subject-level communities on campus.

While it should be celebrated that the school has seen such a sharp rise in level III scores,

the vast majority of the increase lies within the White student population; other demographic

groups seem to be left behind. This infers that several student groups remain behind the curve

when disaggregating the student performance data. Those behind the curve include the typically

underserved groups of English Language Learners, At-Risk students, and students that identify as

African-American. Because these communities exhibit lower year-to-year increases, the

Anderson HS biology PLC must focus its efforts on identifying students in typically underserved

communities and work collaboratively to increase student results within these populations.

Over the last three years, work within the Biology PLC has been a concerted effort to

work collectively to establish common formative assessments that challenge students at or above

the level seen on district common based assessments and the STAAR examination. Teachers use

Blooms Taxonomy to level formative assessment questions and spend considerable time pouring

over assessment data to find what does and does not work. This allows teachers to refine their

formative assessments and instructional strategies. There has been a significant shift to move

towards a classroom environment vastly exceeding the state mandated forty-percent laboratory

time.

This approach has yielded significant results, as previously mentioned. Through the

PLC, the team has been able to shift from a teacher-based model of instruction towards the 5E

learning cycle model, as described by Marek (2008). What is the learning cycle? Marek notes,

The learning cycle is a way to structure inquiry and occurs in several sequential phases. A

learning cycle moves children through a scientific investigation by encouraging them first to
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 8

explore materials, then construct a concept, and finally apply or extend the concept to other

situations (p. 63). By structuring lessons this way, the Biology PLC breaks the pattern of

traditional teacher-directed discourseThis approach to teaching science severely restricts

student engagement and participation by preventing peer-to-peer discourse (Lewis, Baker, Watts,

& Lang, 2014, p. 27). In other words, rather than the teacher simply standing in front of the

classroom and lecturing, the team has shifted to an inquiry-based approach to learning, with

positive results to show for its effort.

Yet even with this shift to an inquiry-based approach to science education, some groups

remain behind. To improve minority outcomes and to extend reach into the advanced science

courses on campus for minority participation, the PLC must continue to shift its focus and move

towards a model that encourages and fosters learning for all student groups. The campus biology

team includes three male teachers, one of whom is Hispanic, and four female teachers, all of

whom are white. As such, there is little representation of minority staff to minority students.

These differences could manifest themselves in teachers misunderstandings as to the

needs of the minority groups on campus. One method that could be used in this would be to use

the PLC as a means to guide teacher professional development. Monhardt (2000) asks, How

should the needs of culturally diverse students be met in the science classroom (p. 19)? This

question should serve as the guiding question for the upcoming school year as teachers seek to

improve student learning outcomes on Anderson High Schools campus and should constitute a

focus for the team as it implements its change model: a strategy based off the adaptive strategy of

mixed-scanning.

According to Hoy and Miskel (2013), Mixed scanning seeks to use partial information

to make satisfactory decisions without either getting bogged down examining all the information
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science 9

or proceeding blindly with little to no information (p. 342). Since Anderson High Schools

mission includes ensuring a premier education for all learners, it is imperative that teachers strive

to reach groups that data indicate are being left behind as other scores improve. Hoy and Tarter

(2003) summarized seven basic rules for mixed-scanning, one of which is Use focused trial and

error (p. 50). As the PLC seeks ways to improve minority student outcomes, it can use

research-based strategies to reach minority students until the team finds an appropriate practice

that works best for the students on Andersons campus. As the culture on campus is strong

towards improving student outcomes, the PLC and its collective efficacy and trust will pursue

success for minority students. However, how do the teachers in the PLC ensure that students in

need of assistance receive mediation when first needed to ensure that success is found?

Dufour notes that the PLC must not wait until remediation is necessary in order to reach

students most in need. Consequently, it is imperative that a true PLC exist in such a manner that

teachers identify students in need as soon as the student has trouble. Dufour (2003) states,

Instead of inviting students to seek additional help, the systematic plan requires students to

devote extra time and receive additional assistance until they have mastered the necessary

concepts (p. 8). In other words, while it may be necessary that teachers identify students at the

outset of difficulty, students must be required by policy, set forth by the department level PLC

expectations, to devote extra time to mastering the concepts that students are having difficulty

mastering. This means that the PLC must have administrator backing requiring mandatory

tutorials and that parents must be advised through contact when students are failing to master the

concepts, thus requiring extra tutorial assistance.

Because the campus has seen such improvement in other student groups, it is imperative

that the PLC, under the guidance of the administrative leadership team, utilize the PLC process
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
10

and the mixed-scanning model for improvement to determine interventions to improve minority

student success. Hoy and Miskel (2013) note, a promising way to school improvement is

through instructional interventions that diminish differences among classrooms and create

positive instructional contexts (p. 324). With the shift to common formative assessments over

the last three year, the classroom differences in biology at Anderson HS have diminished. Even

so, the PLC must continue to work diligently to create an environment where learning is

conducive for all groups. By doing so, the PLC will lay the groundwork for success for all

students, ensuring all student groups are well-represented as students progress through the

curriculum at Anderson High School into more advanced science courses such as AP Biology,

AP Chemistry, AP Physics, and AP Environmental Science.

Current and Longitudinal Student Achievement in Science

An examination of three years of data culled from the Texas Academic Performance

Report (TAPR) from 2012 to present demonstrates that the PLC culture has led to a significant

increase in student outcomes on Anderson High Schools campus; however, some groups have

not seen the increase that others have seen. The following figures demonstrate this increase:

Figure 1.1 2013-2014 STAAR results for Biology

Figure 1.2 2013-2014 STAAR results for Biology


Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
11

In the 2013-2014 school year, 97% of students on campus met the satisfactory standard

for the STAAR Biology exam, with all ethnic groups showing passing rates in the mid-90%

range. Students under Special Education Services (68%), Economically Disadvantaged (91%)

and ELL (86%) were outliers among the disaggregated data points for Anderson High School.

When considering performance at an advanced level, 19% of students met the threshold, with

only 10% of Hispanics, 23% of White students, and 9% of economically disadvantaged students

meeting this score standard. All other disaggregated group data points were not identified due to

too few scores falling within that range.

Figure 1.3 2014-2015 STAAR results for Biology

Figure 1.4: 2014-2015 Advanced Standard STAAR Levels

During the 2014-2015 school year, 97% of students met satisfactory standards, with all

ethnic groups demonstrating performance in the mid-90% range. Economically disadvantaged

students saw a 3% increase over the prior year (from 91% to 94%) with Special Education falling
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
12

5% to 63% passing and ELL students falling from 86% to 75%, an 11% decrease. When looking

at the Advanced Standard scores, the campus saw an overall increase of 4%, moving from 19%

to 23% advanced standard passing. 25% of White, 38% of Asian, and 16% of Hispanics scored

at the advanced level, with no reported scores for African-American or Special Education

students and only 11% of economically disadvantaged students scoring at the advanced level.

Figure 1.5: 2015-2016 STAAR results for Biology

Figure 1.6: 2015-2016 Advanced Standard STAAR Levels

2015-2016 saw an overall decrease on Andersons campus from 97% to 95% of students

passing the STAAR Biology examination. 88% of African-American students (a 9% decrease)

passed while 65% of Special Education students passed, increasing 2% from the year prior. 85%

of Economically Disadvantaged students passed the test, a decrease of 9% from the prior years

results. Where the school saw significant improvement was in the overall percent of students

scoring at the advanced standard, with 34% of students passing at that level, a significant
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
13

increase from 23% the year before. The majority of this increase can be attributed to the sharp

rise in the number of White students scoring at the advanced standard, with Whites increasing

from 25% to 39%.

One does not have to look at simply the STAAR scores from the TAPR report to see that

minority students do not achieve at levels in science at the same rate as their White peers on

Andersons campus. Looking through the other data points contained in the TAPR demonstrates

that the low level of performance for minority students continues to the advanced placement

(AP) realm, with lower overall levels of students participating, taking AP tests, and scoring at or

above the criterion score for the AP examinations.

In the 2013-2014 TAPR report, of which data for AP courses is one year behind, the data

showed that during the 2012-2013 school year, 43.3% of students at Anderson High School

enrolled in and completed an Advanced course. Of that number only 36.4% of African American

students, 39.5% of Hispanics, 35.8% of economically disadvantaged students, and 17.2% of ELL

students attempted and completed an AP course. While the 2013-2014 TAPR does not break

down advanced scores by tested subject, 45.7% of students enrolled in an AP course took an AP

test, with the minority groups showing less participation than their white counterparts.

In the 2014-2015 TAPR, Anderson saw an increase during the 2013-2014 school year in

students completing an advanced course, moving form 43.3% to 45.5%. However, African

American participation fell to 33.2%, Hispanic students jumped from 39.5% to 47% and ELL

students saw a significant increase from 17.2% to 34.2%. Interestingly, this TAPR breaks down

the AP information by subject, and only 9.2% of students in the 2013-2014 school year took an

AP science class, with only 3.6% of African American students taking such a course, the lowest
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
14

participation among all disaggregated groups (outside special education and ELL) on campus.

Looking at results, only 20% of African Americans passed the AP examinations in science at a

level equal to or greater than the criterion, however that increased from 0% the year prior.

In the 2015-2016 school year, results from 2014-2015 showed another improvement in

overall students taking advanced courses, with 48.7% of students completing such a course.

However, an examination of science data did not show an increase, with participation school-

wide falling to 8.6%. Disaggregated data shows that African Americans participated in sciences

at 3.9%, Hispanics at 6.4%, economically disadvantaged students at 5.4% and ELL students at

2.4%. Results for science scores on the AP examination showed that 0% of African Americans

met the criterion score, with all other groups with data in the 40% range.

Research Based Approaches to Structuring and Improving the PLC at Anderson HS

While the preponderance of data exemplifies a sustained focus of improvement at

Anderson High School, the professional learning communities, particularly the Biology PLC,

still have room for improvement. Students not achieving success early, such as the 9 th grade

STAAR Biology exam, are much less likely to challenge themselves with advanced placement

courses. Additionally, staff turnover in the science department can impact student success. Over

the last three years, the biology department has seen a turnover rate of approximately 25%,

complicating efforts to sustain a cohesive PLC environment. As such, administrators and

teacher-leaders conducting interviews for open positions must advance the concept of the PLC to

the applicant at the outset, providing initial expectations for involvement in such a community.

Such ideas may include asking questions related to prior experience with PLCs, asking what

collective work the teacher has experienced through the PLC, and what the teacher will bring to
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
15

the Anderson PLC environment based off what the teacher provided at previous schools using

the PLC model (NEA, 2015, p. 14-15). By initiating expectations from the outset, the

administration will provide the framework through which the new teacher will be expected to

contribute to learning at Anderson HS.

One method that school leadership can focus on when constructing learning communities

amongst teacher groups is to ensure that the groups have common planning time. Dever and

Lash (2013) note, One of the most common issues in implementing professional development is

the availability of timethe most viable solution to this dilemma is the use of common planning

time (CPT) for professional development (p. 13). On the surface, CPT in itself does not

constitute a professional learning community. However, structuring teacher schedules around a

common planning period affords teachers the ability to meet as a professional learning

community during school hours, with administrative support, thus fostering an environment

where teachers are expected to collectively work together to foster improvements for all students.

On this, Jones and Green (2015) note, School leaders must provide time for teachers to

collaborate. Time for collaboration may be more important than other aspects of school, such as

equipment, facilities, or even staff development (p. 2). Common planning time reduces the

isolation that many teachers experience within the school building. This fosters an environment

where teachers can work together to ensure that students receive valuable instruction that meets

the needs of the learner.

Second, teachers must ensure that the PLC is purposeful. According to Strickland (2009),

A successful PLC requires teachers to take the time to meet for discussion and to work between

meetings to read informational pieces and reflect on them and to try things in the classroom and

collect evidence about the results (para. 4). Thus, it is important that the campus administrator
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
16

and PLC lead determine an appropriate meeting schedule during common planning periods. The

shape that this schedule takes is entirely dependent upon the needs of the PLC. While research

on meeting times for PLC is lacking, ideally the PLC would meet on a bi-weekly basis to allow

members to research issues between community meetings and to bring new ideas and techniques

for discussion at follow-on meetings. Data could also be collected in the intervening time

between meetings, thus allowing the team to come together, share data, and create action plans

for follow-on units of instruction.

Third, the community must determine its standards of conduct and methods for

improvement and rely on those norms consistently throughout the year. It would be very easy to

think of such collaboration as helping so-called weak teachers improve their instruction.

However, as Prytula and Weiman (2012) note, The purpose of the professional learning

community is not to shine light on all of the weaknesses of the individual teacher members, but

to draw attention to and share those practices, strategies, and ideas that are working to improve

student learning and then build on them (p. 3). In order function as a true PLC, the PLC must

develop from its outset the operating principles that it works through. Additionally, the PLC

must center its guiding questions on how to improve achievement for all student groups. The

data previously mentioned demonstrates a concerted effort to improve student outcomes at

Anderson HS; yet, minorities are being left behind. Students failing to achieve success early are

much less likely to take advanced courses later. So how does the PLC reach these students and

promote success?

DuFour notes that true professional learning communities have to devote themselves

considerably to three main big-ideas: Ensuring that students learn, a culture of collaboration,

and a focus on results (DuFour, 2004). Structuring the Anderson HS Biology PLC around these
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
17

components as laid out by DuFour will ensure that the PLC is working in collective efficacy to

improve all student outcomes on campus. In order to take the first step towards establishing such

a community, the PLC must establish its operating principles. What does this look like?

Lunenburg (2010) states, For example, successful professional learning communities

believe that all students can learn. That statement will only become meaningful, if faculty are

willing to engage in some deeper questions. For example, if we believe that all students can

learn, we expect them to learn (p. 2). This expectation must extend to all student population

groups in the school, to include typically underserved and under-achieving minority groups. If

kids truly come first and the focus of the PLC is on ensuring all students learn, then every group

should receive the requisite attention it needs to meet this established belief and the PLC should

focus its collective effort toward achieving this belief. As the leader of the faculty, the principal

must model such efforts continuously and communicate expectations to the staff in order to

embed these values in the day-to-day life in the school (Lunenburg, 2010, p. 5). The work does

not stop with the building of a mission or vision statement for the community. The group must

establish its operating norms and set the tone from the outset to begin creating lasting impact on

student achievement.

The building of such a culture requires constant instructional leadership on the part of the

principal and staff buy-in to the concept of the learning community. Obviously, such a process

does not occur overnight. Surely as the shift to such a learning community is taking place, there

will be pushback from teachers and other staff members that do not see the PLC as being able to

implement such change on campus. It all boils down to establishing the culture that the PLC is

how the campus does business. Ivy, Herrington, Kristonis, and Tanner (2008) note, When
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
18

building any new culture that involves changes in thinking from traditional ways of doing things,

any apprehension, misconception, or resistance must be identified and neutralized (p. 6).

Conclusion

Work over the last three years at Anderson HS has led to increased student outcomes on

state examinations. While these increases should be celebrated, concern lies in the fact that

while achievement as a whole has improved; some student demographic groups have been left

behind. As a means to improve student outcomes on campus, Anderson HS must focus its efforts

on establishing true professional learning communities using research-based approaches to reach

all students, including typically underserved minority groups. This can take the form of

professional development to increase understandings of the student demographic groups and

using guiding questions to influence the work of the learning community. While the

establishment of such a community is not easy, focused work through the community will

contribute greatly to ensuring that all student groups receive the instruction necessary for success

in science.
Running Head: Improving Minority Student Success in Science
19

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