Professional development: a key to Kentucky’s educational reform effort

Despite its essential role in educational reform, professional development typically does not receive adequate support in systemic reform efforts. This article presents an exception—a state that incorporated professional development as a central priority in its reform effort and four schools that used state resources to build their capacity for enacting the reform agenda. We describe central features of Kentucky’s approach to professional development, characterize elements of professional development within the four schools, and discuss how these elements promoted three dimensions of school capacity: individual teachers’ knowledge, skills, and dispositions; professional community; and program coherence. Based on this ‘‘image of the possible,’’ we offer recommendations for professional development that supports systemic, standards-based educational reform. r 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.