The Relationship Between Professional Development and Professional Community in American Schools

This paper examines the hypothesis that school-based professional development contributes to school-wide professional community. The analysis draws on the Schools and Staffing Survey of 1993–1994, which included a nationally representative sample of over 50,000 teachers in more than 10,000 schools in the United States. Only about 20% of the variance in professional community lies between schools, but results of hierarchical linear modeling support the main hypothesis. Positive effects of school-sponsored professional development on professional community obtain at both the school and individual teacher levels, suggesting that teachers who participate in school-sponsored professional development benefit not only from their own participation, but from the participation of their colleagues as well.