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CREC Releases Catalog for 2017 Summer Institutes Offering Professional Development Opportunities
ELLEN RETELLE - Director of Teaching & Learning
The Capitol Region Education Council has released the catalog for the 2017 Summer Institutes (www.crec.org/summer), a variety of professional development workshops and seminars for teachers, principals, social workers, psychologists, and technology and educational professionals who work in public, private, charter, and international schools.
CREC’s summer institutes are opportunities for educational professionals in kindergarten through grade 12 schools to deepen their understanding, knowledge, and skills on various topics that align with content areas and grade levels and to engage in learning communities.
The institutes also support educators looking to meet the eight Standards for Professional Learning (SPL) developed and adopted by the Connecticut State Department of Education. ( www.crec.org/c/SPL)
Professional learning…“is the process by which, alone and with others, teachers review, renew and extend their commitment as change agents to the moral purposes of teaching and by which they acquire and develop critically the knowledge, skills and emotional intelligence essential to good professional thinking, planning and practice with children, young people and colleagues through each phase of their teaching lives” (Day & Sachs, 2004, p. 34).
Connecticut SPLs define the characteristics of a high-quality system of professional learning for all educators and staff to support, enhance, and enrich student learning and performance. Connecticut’s eight standards include cultural competence, learning communities, leadership, resources, data, learning designs, implementation, and outcomes.
Learning Communities (LC) is a vital element of the Connecticut’s SPLs. A learning community is a group of people who share values, beliefs, and ethics about engaging in learning from one another and others. That is, a learning community shares expertise, knowledge, skills, and experiences, and works collaboratively to engage in continuous learning to expand teaching skills, deepen teacher knowledge with the goal of enhancing and enriching student learning and academic performance.
CREC’s institutes will help you renew and recharge your commitment to education, and you will learn and reflect with like-minded colleagues. For more information visit: www.crec.org/summer
Day, C., & Sachs, J. (2004). International handbook on the continuing professional development of teachers. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
