PROFESSIONALDOCTORATEINEDUCATIONALLEADERSHIP

Guide for Problem of Practice Reports

A ProDEL Design Paper

PPR-1.1-Fa12

The Professional Doctorate in Educational Leadership (ProDEL) is a program in the Department of Educational Foundations and Leadership in the School of Education at Duquesne University. The program is a design for learning. As such, the program is obligated to heed the pedagogical imperative (Shulman, 2002; 2005) and, therefore, is subject to continuous improvement research. Our efforts to improve the ProDEL program are guided by the principles of design-based research. We treat each element of the ProDEL design as a prototype: each time a program element is implemented, we attempt to assess, evaluate, and improve the prototype. Each iteration of a design cycle informs our efforts to improve the targeted element and the overall design of ProDEL.

ProDEL Design Papers guide learning; inform program policies, processes, and procedures that influence learning; and document the ProDEL design in its various iterations as well as the changes that occur across repeated design cycles. To aid our documentation, each ProDEL Design Paper is coded with three identifiers:

• the program element that is being addressed

• the prototype version of that element

• the term and year of the protoype’s initial implementation

ProDEL Design Papers reflect the collective efforts of faculty, doctoral students, and administrators in the School of Education as well as practicing professionals and scholars with whom ProDEL partners. ProDEL’s design improvement work has been and continues to be informed by participation in the Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED) and its integral relationship with the UCEA Center for Education and Social Justice, which supports the Critical Friends Network that has emerged from the annual Duquesne Educational Leadership Symposium (DELS). For these reasons, ProDEL Design Papers are assigned corporate authorship.

Although ProDEL Design Papers are often shared with colleagues at other institutions, their primary purpose is internal documentation of design deliberations, proposals, and the testing ofprototypes. In combination with CPED@Duquesne Working Papers (early design papers generated as part of Duquesne’s participation in CPED), they document the arguments that emerge from design cycles. The arguments comprise data within a design-based research protocol that drives program improvement efforts.

Suggested reference:

Professional Doctorate in Educational Leadership [ProDEL]. (2012). Guide for problem of practice reports (DP-2.2-Fa12). Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA: Author.

Contact:Rick McCown, Ph.D.

ProDEL Program Director

School of Education

Duquesne University

Pittsburgh, PA 15282

website:

This Guide addresses the Problem of Practice Reports required in Year 2 of the ProDEL program. Its use assumes familiarity with the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines(ProDEL, 2012) and that you have completed the three Core Papers required in Year 1 of the program.

In the first year of the program, candidates generatedthree Core Papers, one for each trimester: Fall, Spring, and Summer. Although Year 1 of the program–and all three Core Papers–was focused primarily on each candidates’ problems of practice, each Core Paper served as a successive approximation of the Dissertation in Practice.

In Year 2 of the program, the successive approximations of the Dissertation in Practice take the form of three Problem of Practice Reports (PoP Reports). As was the case with the Core Papers in Year 1, the PoP Reports in Year 2 will span the courses in each trimester. PoP Reports also continue the pattern of successive approximation of the Dissertation in Practice, but expands the focus of work to include–in addition to the problem of practice–the designs for action by which that problem will be addressed and the generative impacts that can be expected by the enactment of those designs. More pragmatically, the PoP Reports in Year 2 require candidates to expand their focus as learners to the entire set of criterial questions specified in the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines(ProDEL, 2012).

By the end of Year 2 of the program–and the completion of the three PoP Reports–a complete draft of the Dissertation in Practice is expected. That draft will serve as the “proposal” of the final Dissertation in Practice and will be evaluated by a committee in order to provide feedback that will guide the final year of work in the program.

The three Problems of Practice Seminars in Year 2 seek to facilitate the significant learning required for the Dissertation in Practice. Each seminar is taken in conjunction with a course–part of the R&D rotation–that frames our learning and, therefore,will inform the arguments built around the criterial questions in the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines(ProDEL, 2012). The configuration of the courses in Year 2 is given in the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines and, for convenience, are summarized below.

  • PoP Report1will be submitted at the conclusion of the fourthtrimester of the program. The learning activitiesand products in Problems of Practice Seminar 1and Research and Development Rotation: Learning Environments courses will contribute to Problem of Practice Report 1.
  • PoP Report 2 will be submitted at the conclusion of the fifth trimester of the program. The learning activities and products in Problems of Practice Seminar 2 and Research and Development Rotation: Evaluation courses will contribute to Problem of Practice Report 2.
  • PoP Report 3 will be submitted at the conclusion of the sixth trimester of the program. The learning activities and products in Problems of Practice Seminar 3 and Research and Development Rotation: Policy courses will contribute to Problem of Practice Report 3.

The PoP Reports in Year 2 will reflect learningsituated within thegeneral methodological framework of design-based research (c.f., Anderson & Shattuck, 2011). Design-based research is one of three frameworks that underlie ProDEL’s working definition of scholarship in practice (see the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines) and has been discussed in several instances in Year 1, especially in the Research and Development core course. Within the general framework of design-based research, we will focus in Year 2 on the use of strategies and techniques that are being used by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. Those strategies and techniques focus on “learning in and through practice” (a phrase used by Bryk in his presentation to the CPED consortium in June, 2012). Procedures for learning in and through practice–sometimes with varying labels or names–have been used in other professions, but in all cases the focus is on improving performance. Thus, the PoP Reports in Year 2 are expected to apply generally principles of design-based researchand, more specifically, strategies and techniques often referred to as “improvement research.” Our study of “Networked Improvement Communities” will be the primary source of our efforts to develop our capacity to lead improvement in and through practice.

Each learning product in ProDEL represents asuccessive approximation of the Dissertation in Practice and the opportunity to revisit and revise earlier work. This is true also of each of the three PoP Reports in Year 2. The feedback you have received in response to Core Papers 1, 2, and 3 was designed to encourage you to take advantage of that opportunity. The same will be true for the feedback you will receive in response PoP Reports 1, 2, and 3. Additionally, however, PoP Report 3 will be treated as a “proposal” in the sense that it will serve as documentation of all of the arguments that will constitute the final Dissertation in Practice. Thus, PoP Report 3 will be the written document that serves as the basis for a “proposal meeting” at the beginning of Year 3.

When completed, your thirdPoP Reportwill document your interrogation of the naming and framingclaims, the implied claims, the account(s) rendered, design(s) for action, and the generative impacts that you expect your professional agenda to yield. Problem of Practice Report 3 will also include an introduction that frames the arguments that you expect will constitute your Dissertation in Practice.

Minimally, Each PoP Report will be assessed and evaluated by you and your ProDEL colleagues, including the professors of bothcourses in each trimester of Year 2. The assessments and evaluations of the professors will constitute 50% of your grade in each Year 2 course. More important than grades, however, all of the assessments and evaluations will serve as the basis for successively approximating the Dissertation in Practice: the culminating product of learning that represents scholarship in practice (as defined the Dissertation in Practice Guidelines [ProDEL 2012]) and an agenda that enacts the mission of ProDEL:

To transform the practice of educational leadership to improve schools and to do so as a matter of social justice.

Ananalytic performance rubric follows; it is offered as a tool for generating, assessing, and evaluating the PoP Reports in Year 2. Higher levels of performance subsume lower levels of performance in the rubric. The grades attached to the three levels of performance conform to Duquesne University’s policy for grades in graduate courses and School of Education’s expectations for programmatic progress by doctoral students. The levels of performance are characterized programmatically as follows:

Basic:Student performance conforms to minimal requirements, but is clearly below programmatic expectations. Basic level performance–and the corresponding grade–signals possible faculty action.

Developing: Student performance reflects nominal progress toward degree. Performance at this level–and the corresponding grade–suggests that the student is making progress toward the degree and that the work is developing toward programmatic expectations.

Generative:Student performance yields outcomes that impact future work toward the degree and the work of others in the cohort and/or the field of educational leadership. Performance at this level–and the corresponding grade–suggests that the student is meeting programmatic expectations by contributing to the program’s mission.

A Rubric for the Problem of Practice Reports follows on the next page.

A Rubric for Problem of Practice Reports (Year 2)

Elements of Performance /
Levels of Performance
(C) Basic / (B) Developing / (A) Generative
Introducing the Problem of Practice Report / The criterial questions for the Introduction to the Dissertation in Practice are considered. / The guiding claims are addressed (even if earlier iterations are “incomplete”). / The guiding claims and the context of practice are addressed (even if earlier iterations are “incomplete”).
Arguments for the Problem of Practice / Reasons for claims are provided. / Reasons for themajor claims–and other embedded claims pertinent to criteria (e.g., implied claims)–are provided. / Evidence that warrants the reasons and claims is either cited or–if not yet available–anticipated and specified.
Arguments for the Design(s) for Action / Reasons for claims are provided. / Reasons for the major claims–and other embedded claims pertinent to criteria (e.g., implied claims)–are provided. / Evidence that warrants the reasons and claims is either cited or–if not yet available–anticipated and specified.
Arguments for the Generative Impacts / Reasons for claims are provided. / Reasons for the major claims–and other embedded claims pertinent to criteria (e.g., implied claims)–are provided. / Evidence that warrants the reasons and claims is either cited or–if not yet available–anticipated and specified.
Next Steps / Next steps in addressing the criterial questionsare implied. / Next steps in addressing the criterial questions are stated explicitly. / Next steps in addressing the criterial questions are stated explicitly and plans and timeline for the next steps are provided.
Quality of Writing / Writing is mechanically correct and the paper is formatted in APA style. The paper is structured clearly to address the key claims. / The writing and organizational structure are constructed with the reader clearly in mind. / The language and structure establish the writer’s authority for the reader.

References

Anderson, T. & Shattuck, J. (2011). Design-based research: A decade of progress in education research? Educational Researcher, 41(1), 16-25.

Professional Doctorate in Educational Leadership [ProDEL]. (2012). Dissertation in practice guidelines (DP-2.2-Fa12). Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA: Author.

Shulman, L.S. (2002). Foreword. In Pat Hutchings (ed.), Ethics of inquiry: Issues in the scholarship of teaching and learning. Menlo Park: The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

Shulman, L.S. (2005). Pedagogies of uncertainty. Liberal Education, 91(2),18-25.

Guide for PoP Reports (PPR-1.1.-Fa12)1