Professional Learning Communities - 2

Reports in the literature are quite clear about what successful professional learning communities look like and act like. The requirements necessary for such organizational arrangements include:

• the collegial and facilitative participation of the principal, who shares leadership - and thus, power and authority - through inviting staff input in decision making
• a shared vision that is developed from staff's unswerving commitment to students' learning and that is consistently articulated and referenced for the staff's work
• collective learning among staff and application of that learning to solutions that address students' needs
• the visitation and review of each teacher's classroom behavior by peers as a feedback and assistance activity to support individual and community improvement and
• physical conditions and human capacities that support such an operation