Edutopia as Personalized Professional Development

One of the most important qualities of being a school leader is being a resource for staff, students, and parents about the latest and greatest trends, practices, and ideas in education. Sorting through academic research papers is time-consuming and, depending upon the author(s), quite a tedious exercise. Edutopia is a website that manages to find a balance between academic discourse and plainly-worded presentation of the latest in educational research and effective pedagogy. This resource is a bookmark must for any school leader. Not only does it provide engaging, accessible opinion pieces and summaries but it organizes these resources by topic and grade level. In addition, it also has an extensive video collection where you can listen to experts discuss ideas and where you can see videos of different practices in action in an actual classroom setting. One of my favorite aspects of this website is their tendency to summarize ideas or practices in lists. For example: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/year-one-with-3d-printer-vicki-davis - This provides a list of seventeen tips when implementing a 3d printer into a classroom for the first time. These sorts of lists are quick and easy to get through and allows readers to mentally check off things as they progress through the list. One other very powerful feature is the comments section and discussion boards. In these areas other teachers and school leaders post their reactions to articles and videos. This website offers a great deal of easily navigable quality resources that could be utilized by a school leader to provide support for developing teachers. As is true of classroom teachers today, principals, directors of instruction, and curriculum directors don't necessarily have to have all the answers when it comes to student and teacher learning and growth. Instead, they simply need to know how to help the learner find the personalized answers and support that will allow them to realize maximum growth. Edutopia presents a powerful tool for school leaders to do just that.