How often do you meet with your leaders? There are different groups of leaders. In the beginning for two summers, district leaders attended one week leadership institutes. Now we have three two day meetings for each group through the year - plus the time leaders meet with TOSAS to revise course syllabi.

What is the expectation at their school site? Leadership at school sites varies. Due to the mobility of teachers and resistence of some to "lead" in their own school, some district leaders work at their own site and some work at other schools to lead demonstration/laboratory lessons for example. For mathematics assessment we specifically provide leadership a school team. During the training they have short defined sessions to lead at their site. We have found that it is very important to work with principals when planning site-based work. They help set the expectations as a group. For the mahtematics assessment work we created a paper together that listed expectations for the principal, the school teacher leadership team, and the the teacher participants at the school. It was extremely helpful document. The school team is then responsible for providing professional development for their colleagues - we provide technical assistance to help them plan the sessions.

What is your turnover rate of leaders? Leaders come and go. One thing we need to do is keep better records.

You have mentioned a syllabi that is shared with your leaders? The syllabus is a course book. It lists the purpose for the course, what we hope participants will gain from participating, the course agenda, the main points and assumptions that guide the session. THen it outlines the activities from Investigations or FOSS for example that teachers will experience and possible questions to guide the session/dialogue etc. We identify the core mathematics content - "What is the MATH:" is the repeating question. Overheads and other items that leaders will use are included. Masters of any handouts are collected. The TOSAs in EL Centro CA have put together a leader kit for science - a great idea - to accompany the syllabi they have developed. Pedagogy is embedded in the syllabi. The purpose of the course book is to establish consistency within the course offerings. They are modeified as needed.

Time to dialogue is so important for leaders - to really be a part of planning and revising the sessions - while maintaining consistency for participants. Time to talk about teaching and learning with their students is equally valuable.

Boston has a very interesting model for getting started, levels of involvement. Year one begins with a lead team from each school. All staff members are phased as are schools. Due to our mobility we began with structured use for all teachers in a school - a leadership could all be gone at the end of the year. Another approach, that we are using for schools starting now, is to lead with assessment.

Please let me know if you have other questions or need more clarification. Linda