Maximizing Teacher Professional Development Amid Budget Uncertainty
Is there anything more impactful for our students than a highly effective teacher in the classroom?
Even amid budget uncertainty, our teachers and students need — and deserve — for teachers to be supported with effective professional development.
Yet, amid shifting federal, state, and local funding, many instructional leaders may be wondering how best to make important decisions about supporting teacher professional development.
It’s worth revisiting Prof. David Brazer’s advice for leading your school through budget cuts and continuing professional learning in a budget crisis, which he first explored at the start of the pandemic.
“David, you’ve got to cut 40 sections from next year’s master schedule by Monday so I can present our plan to Cabinet.” The chief business officer and the superintendent were looking to eliminate the district’s budget deficit, and they asked me to cut several beloved programs and 10% of my teaching staff.
Even if budget cuts are anticipated, teacher professional development support doesn’t have to suffer. And it must not. Cutting back on PD jeopardizes high-quality instruction, dampens teacher morale, and limits student learning.
Here are four ways that could help you provide excellent professional learning to your teachers on a much smaller budget:
1. Establish priorities.
There is always enough money for the highest priorities.
Now is the time to recenter your thinking on what is at the heart of your school’s mission.
Forcing a focus on whether all resources really are dedicated to your highest priorities might feel like a challenge. But it’s also a major opportunity for you as an instructional leader.
Whether the core of your mission is to close opportunity gaps, institutionalize effective programs for historically marginalized groups, or engage students in ways that increase academic ownership, then focus flexible resources should there.
Knowing what’s most important and highest leverage in your setting is vital before getting into budget discussions or making decisions.
For David, high-quality instruction was always the top priority because he believes what matters most is having excellent teachers in every classroom. A faculty of effective, caring teachers resolves most other challenges. If you agree, resources that support teachers and improve their ability to improve student learning outcomes should be your top priority.
2. Leverage technology
Anticipate cuts and leverage technology to support your team.
As the federal government debates the department of education’s budget, educators are left wondering if they’ll see an increase in Title I funding or considerable cuts from current education spending levels.
This is a moment to consider your options, and the new possibilities available to you.
Personnel costs generally make up 80–85% of a district’s budget.
School and district leaders tend to make the mistake of looking at time spent by their salaried personnel as cost neutral. In fact, it is by far the largest part of their budget.
Rather than fixating on the narrow slice of the budget that represents non-personnel costs, look for ways to help your educators save time and increase their impact.
The principals who partner with TeachFX are looking for better ways to provide teachers with feedback and coaching, in ways that require less time from teachers or instructional leaders. And, they’re realizing what the Gates Foundation’s research confirms: that professional development needs to be less time-consuming and more effective.
PowerSchool recently found that 86% of educators believe that technology helps them personalize learning for their students, but only 38% believe that their school or district effectively uses technology to help with observation, professional learning, or coaching.
TeachFX allows teachers to gather their own classroom insights, without relying on observation. And a randomized control trial showed that teachers reflecting on TeachFX insights for just five minutes reliably change their teaching practice.
Teachers find it’s like having an instructional coach in their pocket, which can greatly increase the impact of coaching and PD, while requiring less time from teachers.
Investing in the right technology can and should help teachers, coaches, and instructional leaders to continue to improve teaching and learning even when resources are limited.
3. Get the most from categorical funding
Unlock federal funding to weather state revenue shortfalls.
Even as categorical funding like Title I funds seem to be at risk of cuts, state and federal categorical funding sources are not disappearing.
And the compliance criteria for various sources of categorical funding are more flexible and inclusive than you might think.
Utilize the remainder of your ESSER or EANS funds.
How much ESSER funding does your state have left to spend? It might be much more than you think.
The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Funds, signed into law in 2021 in response to the pandemic, are still available to many schools and districts.
The third round of funding doesn’t expire until September 2024, but the deadlines for submitting requests vary by state and district. ESSER III is still a considerable source of support for maintaining high-quality instruction to mitigate pandemic learning loss.
In fact, at least 20% of awarded ESSER III grants must be used to address learning loss.
Similarly, Emergency Assistance to Non-Public Schools (EANS-II) funds address post-pandemic teaching and learning supports for independent schools. Private k-12 schools like St. Cecilia in Dallas have used EANS funds to bring TeachFX professional development and instructional coaching app to their teachers and students.
Access special grant opportunities.
Schools throughout the state of Utah have benefited from the state’s STEM Action Center grant program. For instance, that’s how the Jordan School District partnered with TeachFX to support teachers and increase student talk in math classrooms.
What local or state organizations have mobilized to create new funding opportunities to help support your teachers and students?
Take advantage of Title I flexibility
Up to 75% of Title I funds can pay for personnel, with the remainder devoted to materials, software, and equipment.
Title I schools are permitted to purchase technology for the purpose of improving educational outcomes for Title I eligible students.
As long as Title I students are served and have full access to purchased resources, all other students can benefit from Title I-funded materials and programs as well. (Some schools have Title I-eligible students without being designated a Title I school. The same guidelines apply.)
Schools like Atlanta’s Continental Colony have used Title I funds to bring TeachFX’s professional development and instructional coaching app to their teachers, which has benefitted students by increasing engagement and academic ownership.
Maximize professional development opportunities with Title II
Title II has many qualifying criteria to determine funding alignment.
Professional development should be classroom focused, evidence based, data driven, intended to be collaborative, and job embedded.
As long as these criteria are met, funding can be applied to personnel, technology (as long as it’s not simply “product training”), printed material that supports teacher development, and many other means for helping teachers improve their practice.
You can pay for technology support for teachers when it meets one or more of the Title II criteria.
TeachFX actually checks all of these boxes.
Classroom focused: The TeachFX instructional coaching app helps teachers analyze classroom interactions. And they bring those insights into their professional development work with us, making their PD personalized to their own classrooms’ needs.
Evidence-based in that the insights provided in our app and practices shared by our educators are built on decades of research into effective teaching practices.
Data-driven: The TeachFX instructional coaching app provides teachers with objective data about student engagement and the teaching practices that increase it (for example: use of questioning and wait time) and provides instructional leaders with school-wide impact data (for example: school-wide trends in student talk time).
Collaborative: Teachers work more effectively in PLC groups when they bring their TeachFX insights to the conversation. Here’s how Anthony Reid at Howard High uses TeachFX collaboratively with his fellow math teachers.
Job Embedded: With the push of a button, teachers are gathering classroom-focused, evidence-based, data-driven insights into their teaching and their student’s engagement in their learning. It’s all happening as part of their normal classroom practice, without requiring extra time for one more thing.
Use Title III funds to support English learners
Title III pays for coaching and professional development specifically targeted toward EL teachers.
Title III is unusual in that districts must write a grant to get access to funding. Check with your district’s academic services division to see if your district has a grant and learn how the money is allocated. If not, you may want to help write one.
Much of the same flexibility with Title I applies similarly to Title III funding. To continue with the TeachFX example, the findings I mentioned above (Ho, 2005) are true for students with disabilities and plurilingual learners as well — those groups benefit disproportionately from a more dialogical classroom, and because of that our partners often use Title III funding to supplement or fully support our work together.
Don’t let any funding go to waste
If any programs or resources you currently use are particularly effective for low-income students, provide teacher PD, or enhance English learners’ achievement, you’ll want to consider categorical funding sources before cutting them from the budget.
But so many schools and districts have actually not used their full allocation of Title I, Title II, or ESSER funds.
Reallocate what’s left toward resources you can use in the coming year. Consider locking in multi-year contracts with key partners, helping stabilize pricing and avoid letting any funds go to waste.
4. Continuing to improve post-pandemic teaching and learning might take creativity, but it is possible.
Even if funding sources shift or decline, it is possible to continue to improve your supports for teaching and learning. Because one thing will not change: the power of a highly effective teacher to change lives in their classroom.
Principals can start by strengthening their connections with each other. (That’s part of why we convene k-12 principals for conversations about what they’re seeing in their classrooms, what they’d like to see, and how they’re fostering that change.)
Nurture relationships with central office officials and superintendents to allow for frank and productive budget discussions.
Get informed about opportunities and guidelines for categorical fund use – like Title I, ESSER, EANS, or grants specific to your region – to be sure you don’t miss out.
Every K-12 budget situation is as unique as every k-12 school. But these three principles can help you navigate even the most complex situations. Take advantage of underutilized funding, leverage technology to compensate for cuts, and, most importantly, focus resources on your highest priorities and what’s most central to your mission.
