Part 4 - The Parts of the Solution
Karen Seashore Louis identifies the three parts of a solution to the problem of school improvement: professional community, organizational learning, and trust (PCOLT). Though many researchers talk about professional learning communities, Seashore Louis notes that professional community and organizational learning overlap but are not exactly the same. Trust is important to building professional community, but is not exactly the same thing as professional community. You could have trusting environments without having a professional community or without having learning. Seashore Louis then discusses the empirical basis of these three elements. Research literature demonstrates that you can tie each of these components to improved results on standardized tests and on classroom assessments. PCOLT is also related to the quality of instruction: increased involvement of students, more democratic classrooms, in-depth treatment of important key topics, and equitable distribution of learning in the classroom. All of these are indicators of quality instruction.
Think about:
- Think about the following statement and your reactions to it:
- “Mandated professional community is an oxymoron. When you work on an idea and you throw it out into the world of practice, you can’t guarantee that people will use it with love, and I think mandated professional community is one of the hostile uses of this particular concept.”
- Consider again which element of PCOLT you feel is the most important. Based on Louis’ input, has your view changed from the choice you made at the beginning?
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