SBP: Collaborative Research: Improving Engagement with Professional Development Programs by Attending to Teachers' Psychosocial Experiences

随着美国学生群体变得更加多样化，教育机会和结果的长期差异仍然存在。弥补这些差距的努力通常使用集中的专业发展（PD）来支持教育工作者更有效地教授不同的学生。PD涵盖了广泛的主题，如文化响应式教学，学生的包容性实践，以及吸引经历过逆境的学生的策略。什么团结这些不同的PD方法是一个故意和明确的重点，了解学生面临的问题与不同的经验和需求，并装备教育工作者的技能，以克服这些挑战，支持学生的成功。虽然专注PD的需求很高，但对其有效性知之甚少。许多有针对性的PD计划几乎没有效果，有些可能会适得其反。例如，这些项目可能会在教育工作者中产生心理威胁感，导致被排斥、被评判或处于不利地位的感觉。这些结果可能会导致阻力和反弹，破坏计划的目标。为重点PD是成功的，它需要参加教育者的经验。该项目进行的研究，探讨如何集中PD（身份，文化和教学威胁）的心理威胁的三个常见来源塑造教育工作者如何参与和使用集中PD内容在他们的课堂上，以及这种使用如何提高学生的学术经验和表现。两项研究使用焦点小组和调查设计，以检查这些问题之间的国家样本的教育工作者谁参加了各种各样的集中PD的经验。另外三项研究使用随机对照实验来测试减轻教育工作者身份，文化和教学威胁的策略。总之，这项工作提供了深入的见解，创造重点PD环境，所有教师都感到重视，配备了具有挑战性的想法，并能够提高他们的课堂技能。这个奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

As the U.S. student population grows more diverse, longstanding disparities in educational opportunities and outcomes persist. Efforts to remedy these disparities often use focused professional development (PD) to support educators in more effectively teaching diverse students. PD covers a wide array of topics, such as culturally responsive instruction, inclusive practices for students, and strategies for engaging students who have experienced adversity. What unites these diverse PD approaches is an intentional and explicit focus on understanding the issues facing students with diverse experiences and needs, and on equipping educators with skills to overcome these challenges and support student success. While focused PD is in high demand, little is known about its effectiveness. Many focused PD programs have little to no effect, and some may be counterproductive. For example, these programs can create a sense of psychological threat among educators, leading to feelings of being excluded, judged, or disadvantaged. These outcomes can result in resistance and backlash that undermine program goals.For focused PD to be successful, it needs to attend to educators' experiences. This project conducts studies that examine how three common sources of psychological threat in focused PDs (identity, culture, and pedagogy threats) shape how educators engage with and use focused PD content in their classrooms, and how this use improves students’ academic experiences and performance. Two studies use focus groups and survey designs to examine these issues among a national sample of educators who have participated in a wide variety of focused PD experiences. Three additional studies use randomized controlled experiments to test strategies for mitigating identity, culture, and pedagogy threats among educators. Together, this work provides insight for creating focused PD environments where all teachers feel valued, equipped to engage with challenging ideas, and capable of growing their classroom skills.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.