The efficacy of district-based professional development for music educators

Professional development for music teachers is a challenging task for designers of professional development activities. Professional development activities are typically structured to introduce knowledge and skills to improve classroom practice. However, music teachers have a unique set of challenges and skills that are often different from those of their colleagues. Consequently, music teachers often find these in-district activities do not meet their professional development needs (Bauer, 2007; Schneckenburger, 2014; West, 2019). The purpose of this study was to examine the features of school district-offered professional development for music teachers because those features align with the framework of Desimone et al. (2002) and Knowles (1980). The literature review includes the historical origins and evolution of professional development for K–12 education. The literature review continues with review of studies of aspects of professional development experiences for music teachers in K–12 settings. The study portion of this work was an explanatory sequential mixed methods study. The first phase of the study included a survey administered to current music teachers in the Illinois Music Education Association, and the second phase of the study involved interviewing volunteer participants on their professional development experiences. The results demonstrated music teachers most often seek relevance, collaboration, and content-focused activities in their professional development activities. School providers can meet these needs, particularly if they consider alternatives to typical in-district professional development activities.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ed.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Educ Policy, Orgzn & Leadrshp

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2022

Author dc:creator

• Reem, Lara June

Contributors dc:contributor

• Kalantzis, Mary
• Cope, Bill
• You, Yu-Ling
• Dhillon, Pradeep

• Professional Development
• Music
• Educator

Statement dc:rights

• (c) 2022 Lara Reem

Language dc:language

en, eng

Handle dc:identifier

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/117806

OAI record oai:identifier

https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=etdms&identifier=oai%3Awww.ideals.illinois.edu%3A2142%2F117806