RUNNING HEADER: ASSIGNMENT 2: LOOKING FORWARD 1

Unit 2.1: Looking Forward

Katherine Zamarripa

National University

CAPSTONE 690

Professor Youlin Aissa

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Abstract

The content of the paper examines the professional development plan and timeline for the next 5

years as an educator. An in depth look at the explanation for potential growth is explained

throughout the timeline. Also, three artifacts are presented that represent my professionalism as

an educator for the TPE Domain F. The rationale that follows the artifacts will further explicate

the selected resources.

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The Professional Development Plan

We live in a world where we turn the corner and there is a new invention, app or social

media platform that is supposed to make our lives easier. Often, we find ourselves getting

more distracted and lost our initial purpose we set out to do to begin with. In education, we can

find ourselves in similar settings. There are constant new strategies, technologies or theories that

are supposed to help us in the classroom. As teachers in this generation, it is important that we do

not become stagnant. Research and new studies are there to help us help students. If we choose

to not go outside the box and implement new strategies, we may risk the full potential we could

offer to students.

TPE 13 states that educators improve their teaching practices by soliciting feedback and

engaging in cycles of planning, teaching, reflecting, discerning problems and applying new

strategies (ctc.ca.gov p. 17). The professional development planning should be an ongoing plan-a

continuum that doesnt end in ones career. I have never realized how many opportunities there

are to expand ones teaching practices; from conferences to higher education, the choice is up to

the educator to make the decision to use what they learn in the classroom.

I have been very fortunate to have been selected to attend many professional

development opportunities. In the 3.5 years of teaching, I have attended two CADA

conferences-one was my first year teaching, two Avid conferences, one Google Summit, one

CUE Conference and two Culture and Climate Summits with Phil Boyte. My former principal at

El Capitan High School gave me great advice as I was becoming overwhelmed with learning and

wanting to implement new strategies in the classroom. He told me to just take about 3 new

strategies and implement them until they become a norm, then you can look back and implement
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another strategy. It is so easy to become overwhelmed and then discouraged if what you tried

fails. But the great thing with teaching is that failure is an opportunity to try it a different way.

With 5 periods in the day, by the end of the day you have that lesson/new strategy figured out. I

feel like if you want to be a successful teacher you have to be cognizant at all times but we

willing to modify what needs to be improved. Part of developing a professional development

plan, ensures that I will be evolving to make my impact on students better.

Table 1:

This year I have transferred to a new school where I was told there has been a low morale

and school spirit was non-existent. After attending a few Culture and Climate conferences I

decided to take the initiative along with two other colleagues and form a Culture Club on

campus. We invited teachers of great influence in various departments and looked closely at our

problem areas on campus and strategized new ways to help promote a positive school culture. I
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have already been told that staff is seeing a difference in the attitudes of our students and more

teachers are wanting to be a part of this Culture Club. Phil Boyte wrote, As school leaders,

we have one shot at making each students school experience positive. Excellent school culture

serves the greater good of education by making an individual feel cared for, comfortable,

challenged, and safe in order that genuine learning may take place (Boyte p. 12). The school

environment is a pivotal factor in and outside the classroom. But the focus at the beginning of

making a change is not with students, but uniting staff to that positive vision.

The next step to my plan is being inducted to the BTSA program. BTSA has forever

helped me in the classroom. They have given me so many awesome strategies to help with

classroom discipline, lesson improvements and keeping me informed on the latest technological

advances and trends for the classroom. BTSA forces the educator to look closely at the TPE

standards and make sure my lessons are aligned to those standards. Also, having once a week

check-ins with my BTSA mentor has really given me the emotional support I needed as a new

teacher. She had constant solutions for me to try and I could not imagine embarking as a new

teacher without the support of BTSA.

Next on my five year timeline is becoming tenured. I am on track to have tenure in 1

year. I feel very fortunate to be hired as an intern and thankful for Admin believing and

supporting me. As much as the observations of being a teacher on Probe 1 made me nervous, I

felt that with every visit thereafter, I felt more confident and prepared as a teacher professionally.

Tenure will give me that professional accolade that I have strived to achieve in my career.

Now that I am wrapping up my final course in National Universitys Credential and

Masters program, I have my sights set at obtaining a Masters in School Culture from CADA. I
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feel that I have a higher calling which is to assist or even help facilitate our campus to become a

positive and desired place to be for our students and staff. I know CADA offers a program where

you can obtain a Masters in 2 years. Not only is this something I want to learn more about but I

feel as a professional goal, this will help my PDQP stand out and be commended as honorable by

adminstrative staff.

Knowing that staff is a big part of school culture, I would like to continue to have the

opportunity to take more influential teachers to experience the Culture and Climate Summit. The

more teachers that can contribute to the shared positive vision we are trying to build at our

school, that current for change will be strong. So strong that other teachers will buy into what

we are trying to do. This summit experience is so powerful, that with the right people of

influence we could really change our school in about 3 years.

My final goal in my timeline is to present a workshop at a conference. I am not quite sure

on what I would present, but I have a feeling that in about 2 years I will know through

experience what I could present to help other teachers at their schools. Also, with the changes

that I am apart of making now, I will be able to see and help others in 2 years who are trying to

do the same thing my team has set out to do in 2016-2017 school year.

Rationale for Domain F Artifacts

Some artifacts that Costantino recommends to include in ones E-Portfolio that

demonstrates an educator's commitment to profession is: A description of leadership positions

held, evidence of degrees, awards, honors and recognition received, evidence of your volunteer

work, special projects, programs, and participation on committees related to education

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(Costantino p. 48). I have included in my PDQP a committee that I helped initiate, a special

project to help foster relationship building and a recognition that I was recently honored with.

My first artifact is a program that I presented to my colleagues before school started to

help them plan out the first 3 days of school with a different focus. The No School till

Wednesday was developed by another educational professional who believes that if you build

relationships and allow students to know one another, your classroom will be a better

environment for all.

Researchers have found that a positive school climate can help solve a lot of problems.

Studies find that it decreases absenteeism, suspensions, substance abuse, bullying, and increases

students academic achievement, motivation to learn, and psychological well-being. I know that

by helping focus my time outside of the classroom to promoting a positive school culture,

students will look forward to going to school and thus, become more ready learners. Other

schools have no syllabus for the entire first week, but because this was a new concept, my

principal advised that we shorten it to 3 days and make it optional. I plan to present this again for

the next school year and provide more links to help teachers find ideas to bring into the

classroom.

The second artifact is what I had explicated earlier in this paper about initiating a

Culture Club to help build up a positive school culture. The artifact is a visual and live

presentation we used in the meeting. It was our follow up meeting where we focused on some

aspects on campus where we wanted to emphasize and implement for the next school year.

Instead of becoming overwhelmed with the negative of our school, we selected top 3 areas that

we believed we should focus on for next year and strategies on how to improve the areas. Those
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categories of needed improvement were regarding students, teachers/staff and administration. At

this meeting we actually had two Associate Principals present. This showed that they were

willing to help and support the positive change we are trying to accomplish.

The final artifact I have included in my PDQP is my P.R.I.D.E award. Following

Costantinos suggestion of including awards, honors and recognition received, I decided to

include this in my portfolio. P.R.I.D.E is the acronym that we use and strive for at Buhach

Colony High School. P.R.I.D.E stands for Pride, Respect, Integrity, Determination and Equity.

All of our school staff had the opportunity to select one classified and one certificated staff

member to receive the award. I am honored that they have chosen me for the 2016-2017 school

year. Receiving this award encourages me to continue with the mission to help build up our

school culture inside and outside the classroom.

Professionalism is a continuum that teachers should constantly set as a goal. Whether it is

attending educational workshops, conferences or summits, the desire to go beyond the status quo

shows true ability for growth to prospective employers. And when one finds something that

could empower a student, a teacher or the school, the ability to share that resource can be even

more powerful. Harvard Business Review states, Collective Ambition is a summary of how

leaders and employees think about why they exist, what they hope to accomplish, how they will

collaborate to achieve their ambition, and how their brand promise aligns with their core values.

This statement can apply to a teacher as an individual for their classroom and also staff

collectively on a school campus. Ambition is not what I have done but what I want to continue to

do as an educator in my profession tomorrow and in years to come. My PDQP may be found at

the following website: http://zamarripateach.weebly.com.

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References

Boyte, Phil, & Steckler, June. (2015). School Culture by Design: Building & Sustaining Positive

School Culture. Learning for Living.

Costantino, Patricia M., De Lorenzo Marie N., & Tirrell-Corbin,Christy. (2009).

Developing a Professional Teaching Portfolio: A Guide for Success. Upper Saddle

River, NJ: Allyn & Bacon/Pearson.

Zakrzewski, Vicki (2013, August 21). How to Create a Positive School Climate.

Greater Good Magazine. Retrieved from

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_create_a_positive_school_climate.

Ready, Douglas A., Truelove, Emily. (2015). The Power of Collective Ambition.

Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from

https://hbr.org/2011/12/the-power-of-collective-ambition.

https://www.ctc.ca.gov/docs/default-source/educator-prep/standards/adopted-tpes-2013.pdf
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