Friday, November 03, 2006

Professional Development

A few weeks ago, I received an email from the Professional Development Coordinator at TCC. In it, she asked all the instructors to submit copies of all the work they've done under the heading of professional development, so she can keep track of what everyone's doing.

Part of me thinks this is strange. In order to teach at TCC, one doesn't have to hold a teaching certification. If one doesn't have to hold a teaching certification, one shouldn't need to continue with professional development credits to maintain that certification. I mean, I understand that TCC would be interested in having its instructors actively involved in the continuation of their own learning, but it doesn't seem to me that, given the lack of certification, professional development could be considered essential to keeping one's job.

Of course, this is all academic (heh) for me because I DO hold a state certification that I DO want to keep up even though I'm not teaching in an environment that requires it. I have professional development certificates I can submit to the coordinator, and I went around this afternoon collecting them all in one place so I can photocopy them to deliver when I'm back on TCC campus on Monday.

What I didn't realize, though, is that all my professional development hours - all 20 of them so far this year - have involved Holocaust studies. Any more that I take are likely to continue that trend - there are a couple of workshops being held at the Center for Holocaust Studies that I really want to attend.

I'm not sure what this means, if it means anything, really. It's a topic that interests me, that I can mine for a lot of material to use in an English class, and I mean, come on - there's no WAY I can learn everything there is know about it.

I wonder, though - is there a requirement to HOW one earns one's professional development credits. Do I have to diversify?

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