A Quick Review of the PLC Process

» About a 14 percentage-point achievement gap existed between students who were eligible for free and reduced-price meals and those who were not. » Black students were almost twice as likely to receive an out-of-school suspension as white students (as cited in Superville, 2015).

The NYU Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development (2018) finds, “Urban school districts . . . face a continuing shortage of qualified new teachers willing and able to work in America’s most challenging classroom environments.” Brian A. Jacob (2007), assistant professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, notes, “Urban districts’ difficulty in attracting and hiring teachers means that urban teachers are less highly qualified than their suburban counterparts with respect to characteristics such as experience, educational background, and teacher certification” (p. 129). In an executive summary, the New Teacher Project (n.d.) details the crisis of irreplaceable teachers leaving urban districts; leaders do little to retain teachers. This negligent retention of the best teachers makes school improvement almost impossible (New Teacher Project, n.d.).

The goal of this book is to show you how your urban school can make an impact on student achievement and change the trajectory of student lives using available resources— what I call the brilliance in the building. Leaders and staff in urban schools cannot do this work in isolation; they must work together to accomplish their goals. Therefore, I grounded this book in the principles of the Professional Learning Communities at Work® (PLC) process outlined by PLC architects Richard DuFour, Rebecca DuFour, and Robert Eaker, along with PLC experts Thomas W. Many and Mike Mattos (2016).

“The PLC process is not a program”—it is a continuous system for improvement (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 10). DuFour and his colleagues (2016) define a PLC as “an ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve” (p. 10). It is a way of doing business in a school. In a PLC, educators achieve goals and improve their results by working together in collaborative teams. PLCs are organized around three big ideas (DuFour et al., 2016). 1. A focus on learning: PLCs focus on both student and staff learning. For students to learn at high levels, staff must also learn at high levels. 2. A collaborative culture and collective responsibility: Staff members work in teams (rather than in isolation) and take responsibility for each student’s success. 3. A results orientation: Teachers use data as evidence to know if students are learning and to drive improvement.

Members of a PLC engage in discussion about the fundamental purpose of their organization. In doing this, staff determine their mission, vision, values (collective commitments), and goals. These elements (or pillars) are the foundation of a PLC at Work (DuFour et al., 2016).

1. Mission: The mission pillar asks the question, “Why do we exist?” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 39). Answering this question helps staff reach agreement regarding the fundamental purpose of the school. 2. Vision: The vision pillar asks, “What must we become in order to accomplish our fundamental purpose?” In answering this question, staff create “a compelling, attractive, realistic future that describes what they hope their school will become” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 39). 3. Values: The values pillar asks, “How must we behave to create the school that will achieve our purpose?” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 41). Answering this question allows staff to make collective commitments to act in certain ways. 4. Goals: The final pillar enables staff to answer the question, “How will we know if all of this is making a difference?” by identifying targets and timelines (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 42).

Collaborative teams are the engine that drives the work of a PLC (DuFour et al., 2016). The members of collaborative teams in a PLC answer four critical questions to guide their work and achieve the goal of high levels of learning for all students:

1. What knowledge, skills, and dispositions should every student acquire as a result of this unit, this course, or this grade level? 2. How will we know when each student has acquired the essential knowledge and skills? 3. How will we respond when some students do not learn? 4. How will we extend the learning for students who are already proficient? (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 36)

The action steps this book details align with the three big ideas, the foundational pillars, and the four critical questions of the PLC process.

The PLC process uses the brilliance in the building because finding that brilliance means taking action and using the resources you already have—the time and the people—to improve student and staff learning. In a PLC, there is not one teacher of the year doing amazing things with students, but rather an entire school or district filled with many teachers of the year doing amazing things with students. Most teachers enter the profession because they care about student learning and are passionate about making a difference. This is especially true in urban schools, where teachers face so many unique challenges. Teaching in urban schools is tough work, but the impact teachers can make on students and the community is significant. The tools in this book allow educators to start the work of improving adult and student learning immediately—to take action with the brilliance in the building.

I was fortunate to lead two schools to Model PLC certification (see www.allthingsplc.info): Woodside Intermediate School in Cromwell, Connecticut, in 2012, and Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts Magnet Middle School in Bloomfield, Connecticut, in 2016, in just four years. I advocate for the PLC process in urban schools because it helps leaders create a system in which both educators and students learn at high levels. This systems approach creates a way to give all students a chance to be successful. The collaboration component is critical so teachers can learn from and support one another. Urban magnet schools, such