Committee reviews March PD feedback; district plans summer equity-leader workshops and asynchronous training

At the April 23 DEI advisory meeting, Sally Davidson, the district’s Equity, Belonging and Community Engagement Coordinator, reviewed feedback from the March professional development (PD) day and outlined next steps for staff learning on culturally responsive practice.

Davidson said the March PD drew roughly 600 participants in the afternoon sessions and included an estimated 32 concurrent workshops. The event’s content received generally positive remarks, she said, but a substantial share of attendees reported they would have preferred expert-led facilitation rather than self-directed "playlist" activities. "I think it was about half or maybe 40-something percent" who said they would have preferred facilitator-led workshops, Davidson said.

In response, the district is preparing three prongs of follow-up professional learning: a library of mostly asynchronous webinars (some provide completion certificates), a curated list of local PD providers that could supply expert facilitators, and two in-person workshops in early June led by consultant Dr. Kayan Marie Johnson. Davidson said the June sessions are intended for roughly 20 participants — ideally pairs from each school building (an administrator and a teacher) — to develop building-level equity goals and action steps.

Davidson described how the district is still ironing out the process for awarding professional learning units (PLUs) for staff who complete asynchronous material: staff who earn certificates or submit short learning synopses would receive PLUs from Davidson or from Kim Ramos, the district’s technology and MLL coach. "Some of them give you a certificate at the end to show that you did complete the webinar, others don't, and so we're asking instead for a synopsis of your learning," she said.

Committee members and staff discussed attendance patterns, the trade-offs between expert-led and self-guided formats, and accessibility of asynchronous options for staff who prefer private learning. No formal decisions were taken; Davidson said she will finalize communications and coordinate with building leaders on selecting participants for the June workshops.

Speakers emphasized that future PD should balance adult-learning approaches, facilitator capacity, and staff comfort with sensitive topics; the committee suggested reducing the number of simultaneous topics so expert facilitators can be placed in each room if the model is repeated.

Proposed next steps from the meeting included releasing the asynchronous webinar library in June and confirming the list of building pairs to attend the June workshops.