Pre-Service Teachers & Professional Development (Part I)

One of my goals for the upcoming school year is to do a better job encouraging my education students to become more aware of and more active in professional development. While I realize this might seem a little premature, especially since some of my students are still trying to decide whether or not they want to enter the teaching profession, I'm going to place a bigger emphasis on it for several reasons. Here they are, in no particular order:

• Professional development is a fantastic way to make connections and to build a professional network. Attending different conferences has given me the opportunity to meet and connect with so many people I might not have met otherwise. This professional community not only provides some very useful connections, but it also can help participants sustain their interest in and love of what they do.
• Professional development helps expand the voices on education they hear.Because of the size and structure of my department, I'm well aware that some of my students will have me multiple times during their college career. While this is fantastic in terms of giving me the chance to get to know my students and to let us form a cohesive classroom community, it is limiting for them since they don't have a chance to hear other people's perspectives and thoughts on teaching. 
• I hope that early participation will instill the habit of involvement with professional development. By having students participate in professional development, they get to learn about the resources available to them before they get their own classrooms and become overwhelmed by the ups and downs that come with the first years of teaching. Hopefully, they will perceive participating as a valuable learning and teaching tool and will continue to do so throughout their teaching career. Additionally...
• Having an established connection with a professional group can help with the first-year roller coaster ride. Whether it is having a sympathetic ear audience to talk to about the difficulties of teaching or it is learning about some new ideas when it comes to teaching a particular subject, a community of professionals can help ground and support new teachers.
• It all comes down to learning. Not only does participating in professional development give students to learn about what is happening in education and teaching, it also reinforces the idea that learning doesn't end when they graduate. Instead, it is an ongoing process that they need in order to be effective teachers.

What are your reasons for having your pre-service teachers participate in professional development? Please feel free to leave a comment below!

If you have any questions or topics you'd like to see discussed in another post, you are welcome to leave me a comment. In a follow-up post, I plan on addressing how I've integrated professional development in my teacher ed classes, and I'd be happy to answer questions on this topic as well!