Administration Planning Tool

How to Use This Tool

This confidential tool provides Step 2 in a three-step process for planning a comprehensive institutional professional development program. You should complete Step 1, “Identifying and Analyzing Your Institution’s Demographics” before completing this online planning inventory.

This tool is divided into four parts, the first two designed to help you focus on the current state of professional development at your institution and the subsequent two to help you envision professional development in your institution’s near future. Completing the inventory should take 10-15 minutes.

Upon completion, you will receive immediate feedback on your responses, including suggestions for continued brainstorming, research, and planning, and links to helpful resources. You can print the feedback pages for future reference and/or type in your email address at the prompt and the feedback document will be sent to you electronically. You cannot bookmark the link to your feedback document for later retrieval by your Internet browser.

—Please use Microsoft Explorer as your browser to use this tool.—

STEP 2—
North Carolina Administrator Planning Tool

Section I. PAST EXPERIENCE/STATUS QUO

1. What types of professional development do you currently offer? (Select one.)	Full-time faculty	Adjunct faculty	All faculty	None
Full-day workshops
Half-day workshops
1–3 hour workshops
Conference attendance
Faculty retreats
Brown bag sharing sessions
Self-paced online tutorials
Formal schooling (tuition reimburse.)
Facilitated online courses
Resource center for teaching
Release time to work on projects
Teacher externships in industry
E-mail discussion groups (forums, listservs)
Face-to-face discussion groups
Faculty exchange program
Sabbatical leave
Summer institutes

2. Is professional development required for full-time faculty?

Yes No

3. Is professional development required for adjunct faculty?

Yes No

4. Does your institution provide professional development specifically for new faculty?

Yes No

5. How many hours per year does the average faculty member spend in professional development activities?

      0–12 hours
      13–24 hours
      25–36 hours
      More than 36 hours

6. What percentage of faculty attend at least one professional conference each year? (Choose one.)

      0–5%
      6–20%
      21–45%
      46–70%
      71–95%

7. How are professional development funds distributed at your institution? (Select one.)

      By department
      By the faculty development or other administrative office
      By a professional development committee
      No funds available/not applicable

8. Who coordinates the delivery of professional development programming at your institution? (Check all that apply.)

      Centralized faculty development office
      Individual departments
      Professional development committee
      Other

9. Does your institution have written procedural guidelines for professional development activity approval and participation?

Yes No

10. Who approves faculty involvement in professional development activities? (Select one.)

      Supervising administrator (department chair, dean, etc.)
      Faculty development office
      A professional development committee or task force
      Approval not required

11. Have you conducted a professional development needs assessment?

Yes No

12. Do you have a professional development mission/goals statement?

Yes No

13. Consider the total number of professional activities made available by your institution. Estimate the percentage of professional development activities offered at your institution in the following categories. (Total should equal 100%)

      Discipline-specific professional development
      Teaching and learning; instructional/organizational strategies
      Career and personal development
      Integrating technology into the classroom
      Developing and teaching online courses

14. When are professional development activities offered at your institution? (Check all that apply.)

      During the day on weekdays
      Weekday evenings
      Weekday lunch hours
      Saturdays
      Summers
      Online resources available anytime

Section II. INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT

1. Indicate the levels of support for strategic professional development programming on your campus among the following group of individuals.
	Strongly Supports 1	2	3	4	Does Not Support 5
President
Vice President
Deans
Directors and Division Administrators
Department Chairs

2. What methods does your institution use to partner with other colleges to provide professional development? (Check all that apply.)

      No current partnering activities
      Faculty exchanges
      Cost sharing/co-hosting experts to deliver workshops
      Open workshop enrollment for faculty from partner institutions
      Peer group meetings of discipline-specific faculty groups
      Other

3. How does your institution communicate your professional development plan and programs to intended recipients? (Check all that apply.)

      Divisional and department meetings
      Annual professional development day
      New faculty orientation
      On college web site
      Through interoffice mail
      Through interoffice e-mail
      In faculty or campus newsletter
      Other

4. Your professional development should support other planning efforts at your college. In your opinion, which of the following is the most important for your plan to support?
Rank in order from 1 (most important) to 4 (least important).
	Our college's mission statement
	Our college's recruitment and retention efforts
	Our college's academic master plan
	SACS professional growth criteria

5. What incentives do you offer for faculty to engage in professional development? (Check all that apply.)

      Stipend
      Release time
      Step increase/promotion
      Merit pay increase
      Tuition reimbursement
      Public recognition
      Awards for teaching excellence
      Letter from President
      Certificates of completion
      Sabbaticals

Section III. DESIRED GOALS

1. Rank in order of priority (1 being highest, 6 being lowest) your desired results for professional development at your institution:
	improved quality of instruction
	professional renewal
	improved retention rates
	changed college culture
	increased enrollment
	improved student grades

2. What types of professional development would you like to ADD to your current offerings?	Full-time faculty	Adjunct faculty	All faculty	None
Full-day workshops
Half-day workshops
1—3 hour workshops
Conference attendance
Faculty retreats
Brown bag sharing sessions
Self-paced online tutorials
Formal schooling (tuition reimburse.)
Facilitated online courses
Resource center for teaching
Release time to work on projects
Teacher externships in industry
E-mail discussion groups (forums, listservs)
Face-to-face discussion groups
Faculty exchange program
Sabbatical leave
Summer institutes

3. Assign your desired percentages of professional development offerings among the following categories: (The total should equal 100%)
	Discipline-specific professional development
	Teaching and learning; instructional/ organizational strategies
	Career and personal development
	Integrating technology into the classroom
	Developing and teaching online courses

4. Prioritize your professional development audience from 1 to 4: with 1 being the highest priority.
	New faculty
	Adjunct faculty
	Mid-career faculty
	Pre-retirement faculty

5. Will professional development be required?

Yes No

6. If yes, how many hours will be required?

      0-12 hours
      13-24 hours
      25-36 hours
      more than 36 hours

7. To what extent will professional development play a role in faculty evaluation?
	It will not be a part of faculty evaluation
	Individual departments and/or faculty members may decide to include their activities in the evaluation process. i.e. they develop their own evaluation elements.
	Faculty members are required to assess their own level of participation in professional development activities and submit this assessment to their supervisor for inclusion in their evaluation packet.
	All faculty are evaluated by an administrator and the process includes a review of professional development activities. Faculty members set professional development goals each year and are evaluated on how well they accomplished them.

Section IV. EVALUATION

1. Which of the following will you use to measure the effectiveness of professional development workshops and activities? (Check all that apply.)
	Participant satisfaction surveys
	Increased faculty participation in professional development activities
	Student success factors (such as grades and completion rates)
	Classroom observations
	Pre and post-assessments during each professional development activity

2. How will you track the professional development activities of individual faculty members? (Select one.)
	Database or files maintained by department
	Database or files maintained by faculty development office
	Portfolio maintained by individual faculty members
	Classroom observations
	Will not track individual faculty participation in professional development