Professional Growth and Development

EEC Certification and CECE Employment
As part of the qualifications for teaching and administrative positions at Fort Hill, teachers and administrators must maintain EEC certification. The responsibility for completing the requirements of certification lies with each individual. Among the EEC requirements for certification is annual completion of the required professional development and the record keeping associated with this both within the school and in the EEC Professional Qualifications Registry.
 
The EEC requires that all full-time educators complete annual professional development as detailed below. Professional development hours are based on the calendar year, January – December., ie., the required number of hours must be completed by December 31st each year.
 
Professional Development. Educators in large group and school age child care programs must participate in professional development activities as follows: 
 
1. Educators working fewer than ten hours per week shall complete a minimum of five hours of professional development activities per year; 
2. Educators working at least ten but fewer than 20 hours per week shall complete a minimum of 12 hours of professional development activities per year; 
3. Educators working 20 or more hours per week shall complete a minimum of 20 hours of professional development activities per year. 4. At least one third of the required professional development must address diverse learners.
 
 
Additional EEC requirements include CPR/First Aid and other trainings that must be completed on a repeated time schedule and may not be counted toward the 20 hours of professional development.
 
Fort Hill supports teachers in many ways to fulfill some of the EEC requirements for professional development. However, the responsibility to fulfill the requirements and maintain the certification lies with each individual. Fort Hill does not offer time out of the classroom to complete professional development except for trainings offered on professional days and occasional external conferences, which receive prior approval.
 
Smith College employees are required to identify annual goals. The activities identified in the goal-setting process may or may not qualify as professional development hours for EEC. Individuals are responsible for completing activities they identify with their goals. The CECE does not guarantee time-off or funding to pursue activities identified in the goal-setting process.
 
Professional Days
Fort Hill offers some training on most of the professional days during the year. Each participant receives documentation of the training, which must be returned to assistant director with a signature and logged in the notebook in the office. The assistant director adds the school-wide training to each participants Professional Qualifications Registry.
 
CPR/First Aid is among the trainings offered annually; Fort Hill pays the fees associated with the training.
 
The professional day professional development opportunities are not sufficient to meet the annual 20-hour requirement.
 
Conferences
Professional development conferences that align with individual professional goals as well as school-wide goals and philosophy will be considered for approval for funding and/or time-off. Teachers may submit a professional development request through Google Drive to attend a conference to access funding and/or time-off. Martha (the director) considers many factors in addition to alignment with the individual’s identified goals and the school’s goals and philosophy in determining approval for funding and/or time-off. These factors include the nature of the conference, the potential impact the participation may have on children’s, families’ and teachers’ future experiences at Fort Hill, the cost and availability of funding, the length of the conference, the participants’ prior opportunities to attend conferences, availability of a substitute, as well as other factors. 
 
If attendance at a conference that is held on a week day is approved, the participant must also submit a time-off request.
 
Lori (Office Coordinator) manages registration and payment for all external conference requests. Once a request has been approved and a substitute arranged, if necessary, the participant communicates with Lori about the registration and payment.
 
Web-Based Professional Development
Online professional development is completed on each individual’s personal time. 
 
The CECE Moodle site, Fort Hill Professional Development and Resources, offers a wide range of modules to earn professional development hours. Each of these modules requires reading and/or audio/video as well as a written reflection and documentation of participation. 
 
Webinars and short courses sponsored by outside agencies (e.g., Zero to Three, Early Childhood Investigations, EECmay qualify for professional development hours. If there is a fee associated with a webinar, please check with Martha to determine if the event may qualify for funding.
 
The Smith College portal provides all employees access to the online training site, Lynda.com. These trainings may qualify for professional development hours. Please see Martha if you would like to receive hours for participating in one of these trainings.
 
Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC)
Many interesting and relevant courses are available as MOOCs through EdX, Coursera, individual institutions of higher learning, and more. 
 
Credited Courses through the Smith College Tuition Benefit
All employees working over 17.5 hours per week for one year or more are entitled to the tuition reimbursement benefit offered by the College. Fort Hill does not provide paid time-off or departmental funding for fees or materials associated with these courses.
 

Contents

Professional Growth and Development

The College and CECE administration value the professional growth and development of each member of the Fort Hill community.

The CECE offers many opportunities for teachers to engage in professional development opportunities and expects that teachers will pursue high quality professional development independently. Professional development is an integral aspect of the goal-setting and performance review process and the activity should reflect identified areas for gaining knowledge and skill.

Massachusetts EEC Regulations

The EEC regulations require full-time teachers to complete 20 hours of professional development each calendar year. One third of those hours must address diverse learners. Teachers maintain responsibility for obtaining and documenting the required professional development hours online in the EEC Professional Qualifications Registry and in the binder on the shelf above the copier in the office. Teachers must also submit documentation of their hours to the assistant director as part of their EEC personnel file.

Fort Hill annually provides a minimum of seven hours of professional development that address diverse learners.

Please read the EEC Professional Development policy for additional information on meeting the requirements for professional development.

Opportunities for Learning and Development

The College and CECE department offer a wide variety of professional opportunities, which include the activities described below. All professional activities must be approved in advance; teachers complete the documentation as described in the section below, Requesting Time-off and Funding for Professional Development.

Credit Courses

The Smith College Employee Tuition Benefit provides funding for employees to take courses at Smith and other institutions. Please contact Human Resources for details.

Conferences, Workshops, and Lectures

CECE Sponsored events

The CECE provides funding for teachers to attend conferences and workshops provided by external organizations. The department also sponsors events periodically.

smith College events

Smith College offers a wide variety of workshops and trainings. For example, please see see the ITS Technology Training site and the Human Resources Learning and Development site.

The College also sponsors many lectures and symposia each year. Please see the Smith online eDigest for listings of campus-wide events.

Collaboration and Engagement with Colleagues

visits to other schools and programs

Teachers are encouraged to arrange professional visits to other schools.

knowledge and expertise within CECE

The facility and infrastructure support collaboration among classroom teachers with full-light glass doors, connected classrooms and open central spaces. The teachers at Fort Hill are an extraordinary group of educators; the design of the facility, and the structure of the calendar and daily schedules, offer opportunities to learn from each other.

Supervising teachers share common planning time each day. The purpose of this shared time is to support and facilitate collaboration and professional dialogue. The administration strives to provide teachers with additional planning time as frequently as possible to enable them to reflect and communicate the many facets of early childhood education.

A mentoring system provides further opportunities for learning from one another.

Supervising teachers communicate curriculum through blog posts. The process of documenting, editing, and analyzing children’s thoughts and behaviors to communicate to an audience of colleagues and families promotes the growth and development of all involved.

visiting colleagues

The CECE hosts visits from local community programs as well as from throughout the United States. We offer visitors time for observation and dialogue and find these visits enhance our practice and learning, as well.

Department Professional Days

The program closes for monthly professional days and for a week of professional days in August. Supervising teachers have an additional three days during Spring Recess. Each professional days includes opportunities for formal professional activity as well as for meetings and collaboration with colleagues.

Each professional day includes a professional development training. The assistant director provides documentation to each staff member verifying attendance, the title, the number of hours, and the core competency addressed. Staff members are responsible for recording the information in their EEC Professional Qualifications Registry and in the Professional Development binder in the office, and for submitting the documentation to the assistant director to be included in her staff file.

Three days during the Spring Recess are dedicated professional days for supervising teachers to complete a long-term collaborative professional development activity, which they use in a leadership capacity to promote the growth and learning of all members of the Fort Hill community. This may be a research project to investigate a topic of child development, learning or teaching, or may to be to research and articulate a philosophical or curricular aspect of the program.

Web-based Professional Development

Moodle

The CECE director maintains a Moodle site as a platform for teachers to receive EEC professional development hours by completing online learning activities. Each module includes presentations, readings, and written exercise. To receive credit, the student must complete the two Word documents in the module.

Please talk to the director if you have suggestions for additional topics for the Moodle site.

LYnda.com

The College provides access to the online learning site, Lynda.com through the Smith College portal.

Moocs

Teachers are encouraged to explore the opportunities offered through MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) such as EdX and Coursera.

Director’s Blog

The CECE director’s blog provides resources on child child development and education or parents on the Learning and Development page.

Professional Reading

CECE professional library

The CECE director maintains a library of professional books in her office. A bibliography of the collection is available on Moodle. Lending is managed through a card catalogue system.

shared Reading

The director periodically purchases a book for each teacher to engage in a shared reading and discussion. This book reflects the philosophy of the program, supports professional development on a school-wide issue, or may promote discussion on a new initiative. Teachers read the book over the summer and engage in discussion related to the book during the academic-year.

Requesting Time-off and Funding for Professional Development

The director must approve professional development in advance. To request funding and time-off for professional activities, teachers access the Teacher Folder/Forms and Guidelines/Time-off and Professional Day Requests/Professional Development Request Form (please see details in the Time-Off section). Please note the form requires details of the event and the funding required. The directions on the form read:

Please submit this form to request time-off and/or funding to participate in a professional development activity.  Professional development activities that align with individual professional goals and school-wide goals and philosophy will be considered for approval.

 Before completing this form, please talk to the assistant director to verify that a substitute is available (if one is needed) and submit a time-off request. Please note that the time-off request approval is conditional based on the approval of this Professional Development Request Form. You will receive an e-mail letting you know if this request is approved.

Please submit this form, and confirm approval and time-off, before requesting funding or planning attendance. Once your activity has been approved, please see the office coordinator to make arrangements for payment. All registration payments must be made directly by CECE (i.e., we will not reimburse registration expenses).

Documenting Professional Development

Teachers submit documentation of their professional development activities to the assistant director and to the EEC. The Massachusetts EEC requires that documentation of professional development include:

  • Name of the professional development activity
  • Topic(s) covered and the core competency area(s) addressed
  • Number of contact hours completed
  • Date the course or training was completed
  • Instructional method (lecture, distance learning, etc.)
  • Name of sponsoring organization

When a teacher completes a professional development activity, s/he:

  • records her professional development activities in the binder titled Professional Development, which is located on the shelf above the copier in the office.
  • submits the documentation to the assistant director.
  • records the professional development in her EEC Professional Qualifications Registry.