TEXARKANA, Ark. -- After completing a rigorous review process conducted by the Arkansas Department of Education and Professional Learning Community experts, Fairview Elementary was recently selected for Cohort 6 of the PLC Project.
PLC is 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. The Arkansas Department of Elementary and Secondary Education supports schools in becoming PLCs through professional development and partnership with Arkansas practitioners.
Arkansas High School was selected into the PLC Project for 2021-2022, and this is the completion of their first year.
Fairview Principal Bryan McDonald said one of the main reasons for applying to be part of the PLCS at Work Cohort is to have assistance and coaching in how to release control to teacher teams to impact student learning.
"It's huge," McDonald said. "We were one out of 15 schools to be a part of this cohort. We're extremely honored to be a part of it, and it's just going to provide us with a whole lot of targeted training with our staff individually."
The three-year process, which includes seven days of network professional development each year, is geared to guide schools in transforming their culture to improve student academic achievement. Prior to being accepted into Cohort 6, Fairview worked with Solution Tree and the PLC Regional Network.
"With the PLC project that we got, we will get actual coaching days on-site," McDonald said. "So, the Solution Tree associates will be coming to us to work with us individually. It's about 50 days of coaching.
"If we reached out to Solution Tree to do that on our own, we'd be looking at paying like $7,000 a day. But the State Department is going to be paying for us to do this, so it's just a huge resource for us."
He said at the end of the day, the students at Fairview will be the ultimate beneficiary of the cohort.