OM DENNE EPISODE
Host Dr. Alison Leveque introduces the READ podcast and a conversation about effective professional development (PD), The Windward School’s PD structures, the “Mississippi Miracle,” and current PD trends. Betsy MacDermott-Duffy shares the COMPASS framework for research-based PD: tying learning to content, making it ongoing, modeling with metacognition, active participation, advice/feedback through coaching, shared collaboration, and self-reflection, emphasizing student outcomes and fragile transfer without sustained support. Colleen McGlynn describes Windward’s layered PD system, including assistant teacher training, weekly Friday PD, and monthly content meetings guided by teacher needs, coordinator coaching, and research trends, with time to practice and follow up. Dana Carr-Ford and Kinjal Nicholls discuss Mississippi’s fourth-grade reading gains, attributing success to structured literacy, preservice reform, universal screening, strong accountability including a third-grade gate, and sustained training, then highlight growing focus on writing, executive function, AI limits for struggling readers, and emerging “math wars.”
00:00 Podcast Welcome
00:38 Meet Betsy MacDermott-Duffy
01:26 Why PD Often Fails
02:29 COMPASS Content Focus
04:50 Ongoing Follow Up
07:26 Modeling In Action
09:32 Practice And Participation
10:34 Feedback And Coaching
11:49 Collaboration And Reflection
16:34 Top PD Researchers
19:05 Windward PD Workshops Plug
19:18 Meet Colleen McGlynn At Windward
20:23 How Windward Plans PD
25:01 Measuring Impact And Iterating
28:35 Advice For Busy Teachers
30:39 Five Strategies Takeaway
31:28 Mississippi Miracle Explained
34:06 Marathon Mindset and PD
35:10 Accountability and Third Grade Gate
37:25 Structured Literacy Framework
38:35 Applying Lessons to New York
41:53 Writing Instruction Returns
44:42 Executive Function Skills
46:04 AI Limits in Learning Support
48:00 Math Wars and Explicit Teaching
49:39 PD Takeaways and Call to Action
51:47 Closing Summary and Courses
Produced by The Windward Institute, a division of The Windward School (NY).
www.thewindwardinstitute.org
