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Hitting the PLC ‘Reset Button’
By Samantha Rodriguez, Supervisor of Curriculum and Instruction, North
Arlington Public Schools
“Boring” People the material we discussed. This mental- the last decade or so, have the potential
About 13 years ago, when I was study- ity, one of being accountable for my own to fall along the wayside when they are
engagement in any task, has slowly but
not nurtured. They become just another
ing for my undergraduate degree at surely rooted itself into my professional item to check off the list. More often than
Rowan University, I had a professor, belief system. The ability to engage is we would like to think, our trusted edu-
who said, “There is no such thing as not always natural, so to speak. It is a cators find themselves reverting to the
a boring topic; there are only boring skill that needs to be acknowledged, tasks they find comfortable or necessary
people. If you choose to be interested, cultivated and developed. (i.e. answering emails, updating grades,
you will be; you’ll learn something new. checking text messages… gasp!), when
If you choose not to be interested, you’ll “To PLC, or Not to PLC?” That they should be engaging in meaning-
learning nothing. Then, you’ll be both is the Question ful discussions that could benefit their
bored and boring.” That was it; I was students. Quite frankly, they engage in
instantly hooked. Mind you, it was the Just as administrators are barraged with forced PLCs — a term cleverly coined
first day of class. The syllabus was the a surplus of mandates, emails, phone by my current principal. A forced PLC is
length of a short novella and this particu- calls, testing schedules, and day-to-day essentially a vortex of wasted time that
lar class didn’t exactly correlate with my stressors, our teachers feel the direct can be avoided with the right attitude
major. However, I distinctly recall hang- effects of this certainty. Unfortunately, and approach. With this in mind, I would
ing on to every single word my professor Professional Learning Communities like to share some simple concepts I
said. To this day, I am still fascinated by (PLCs), having been quite the rage for presented to my own staff this past fall.
Educational Viewpoints -40- Spring 2018
