103: Empowering Educators through Online Professional Development with Stride PD Center's Darren Reed

Holly Owens (00:02):

Hello everyone, and welcome to another amazing episode of Edup Ed Tech. My name is Holly Owens

Nadia Johnson (00:11):

And my name is Nadia Johnson, and we're your hosts

Holly Owens (00:15):

And we're super pumped. Today. We have a fabulous guest who is already energizing us. As we were having our intro chat, we have Darren Reed, who is a senior executive and head of the Stride Professional Development Center with us. Darren, welcome to the show.

Darren Reed (00:32):

Thanks so much. I'm excited about our time together today. Thank you. We're

Holly Owens (00:36):

Going to have a lot of fun. We love having fun here and having great conversations. But before we jump into everything, stride in the Professional development Center, we definitely want to know a little bit about you. Tell us about your journey, how'd you get here? Tell us about all your experiences.

Darren Reed (00:53):

Wow, absolutely. Well, I think I'll start the fact that this is my 31st year in education, which is hard to believe. Seemed like just yesterday I started teaching. Most of that time has now been in the private sector. The majority at one point was in the public sector. I was a traditional school leader, principal teacher, and those kinds of things came to 2000 and 2008 came to K 12, who was the leader in online learning in the K through 12 space. They were looking for educators to really help inform this changing demographic in the online education space. It was no longer just homeschool students, but rather a cross section of every student in the country who were looking for other options. So I came on at that time, and really it was exciting to help imagine new schools and schools of the future. Some of my early work included helping to develop some of the country's first blended schools that married the best of face-to-face and online learning.

(01:51):

We opened some cool overage under accredited schools in Chicago, San Francisco, San Jose, and a lot of that work really formed the basis of a lot of the blended schools that we see today. Golly, you hit a bunch of roles at Stride at K 12 over the years that I won't focus so at all. But I did actually leave for two years and come back. I went to go serve as the executive director of New Leaders for New Schools, their flagship program, the Aspiring Principals Program, really believe in development of school leaders and educators. And so that was a real passion of mine, but then ended up coming back to Stride two years later because they Call

Holly Owens (02:28):

That a boomerang employee.

Darren Reed (02:31):

I am Ang indeed,

(02:34):

And it was exciting. I was able to bring some of that experience and help launch some of our initial professional development and training here at Stride for educators and school leaders. And since that time, I run our largest region as a company, the Eastern region, overseeing all of our online and blended schools across the country, working with boards and school districts across the country. And then over the past year and a half, I've now been the Stride Professional Development Center where we've taken all that we've learned about training school leaders and educators and online learning and really helping to transform the professional development space for teachers and educators by bringing on-demand content to them at all times. So really excited about that. That's my journey in the nutshell. Thanks for asking.

Holly Owens (03:23):

Of course. Oh, it a love professional development for teachers. And it sounds like just from knowing like you already, I can tell that it's something that really gets teachers excited and it also that it's something and just researching a little bit that they feel is fulfilling and they feel is worth it. I know at certain times, and Nadia and myself are both former educators, that professional development definitely felt forced on us,

Nadia Johnson (03:48):

Especially, oh, you have to recertify and things like that. It was like, oh, I don't want to sit through this all day training when I could be doing something else.

Darren Reed (03:57):

Holly, if I can, I think you hit on a key point. I'd just like to

Holly Owens (04:02):

Right

Darren Reed (04:02):

Away.

Nadia Johnson (04:02):

Yeah, absolutely.

Darren Reed (04:03):

That's really rooted in a lot of the market research we did, and that's unfortunately 31 years after starting my education career, a lot hasn't changed unfortunately, as it relates to professional development. We've assessed a lot of educators, school leaders, and they still describe it as often being episodic, not relevant. One size Could have put it in the email, Could have put it in any email, right?

(04:32):

It's a little unnerving to think that, and this is at a time where our nation is facing a teacher crisis, so we need to give teachers what they need. And as a former school leader, there are times when data says that, Hey, we all need this. We get that. We're not changing that, but we're saying you need to also empower teachers and put the power of learning in their hands and let them choose. They know what they need more oftentimes than we do. So it's definitely addressing that issue with pd. So I'm glad you shared that.

Nadia Johnson (05:05):

Yeah, I think some of the hardest thing, the hardest type of people to teach is teachers because we know how to teach and we have a certain way in which want to be taught. So I think

Darren Reed (05:20):

That's

Nadia Johnson (05:21):

Interesting that

Darren Reed (05:22):

You guys have put so much thought and intentionality.

Nadia Johnson (05:26):

I love that. Absolutely. Yeah. Who inspired you along this journey

Darren Reed (05:33):

And you

Nadia Johnson (05:33):

Shared more about your who along the world? Yeah,

Darren Reed (05:40):

Absolutely. That's a great question. So many folks have inspired me. I will say this, and I don't mean to be cheesy or at all, but the young people have inspired me the most. And I say that because the young people that I've taught, because I think we all have our story, and my story growing up in East Cleveland, Ohio was one that it was teachers and educators and mentors who really helped shape me and really helped build the trajectory of my life and my career. And so entering the classroom, the last thing you could do was convince me that these kids weren't geniuses and couldn't learn. And so my inspiration really came from seeing the light bulbs come on from my kids throughout my career. And I think it's a good point to say that people always say, what's your journey? Or, I never wanted to do anything but teach. I really didn't. But most of us, once you experience that and have a level of success, you want to expand your footprint. How can I impact more kids? And certainly there were mentors and folks who inspired me. Teaching is about stealing, can't even name the number of teachers I've stolen good ideas from,

Holly Owens (06:57):

Borrow

Darren Reed (06:58):

It, borrowed, and then we give them away Sherry. But it really is the students who are the inspiration. Even now 31 years later, I still feel so energetic about this work because ultimately you impact students when you impact educators and help them be their best selves. So

Holly Owens (07:19):

Oh, that's so awesome and inspiring and definitely, and I said the same thing. I was like, I'm going to be a teacher from life. And then I fell in love with ed tech and instructional design and now have the podcast. Everything is just, you want to just this impact and this you're learning and then you turn around and you're giving back at a certain

Darren Reed (07:41):

Point, a certain stage in your career. So it really sounds like that's what you're doing now or have been doing for

Holly Owens (07:48):

Quite a bit.

Darren Reed (07:50):

Yeah, and you're right. Look at the impact you guys are having. We're still doing the work.

Holly Owens (07:55):

Yeah. We're super excited about how fast the show has been growing in the past six to 12 months. It's really cool to hear from people how much they like certain episodes or they love what we do, and it's just really inspiring all around. And as you know, we touch on a lot of different topics

Darren Reed (08:14):

Indeed,

Holly Owens (08:16):

In education related. Alright. I'm going to ask the next question, but I'm going to change it up a little bit. We usually ask the guests about EdTech and defining that and what that is, but I want to know from you, how do you define professional development?

Darren Reed (08:33):

Oh,

Nadia Johnson (08:34):

Good question. Yeah, that's a good

Holly Owens (08:35):

One. That

Darren Reed (08:36):

Is a really good question. First of all, it is such an umbrella term, right? There's so much. It spans industries. No particular industry owns it as it relates to educators and schools and teachers. And it's really about sharpening your practice. That's what I, it is at the core, at its heart, what it's become at its worst state, right? Obviously there are great things about it and there are great PD that schools and districts and folks have all over, but at its worst, it's also a check the box. It's a what do I need to do to be recertified, to continue to stay current enough just to get by. But I think the research even shows us that teachers want to learn, they want to grow. And one thing I like to say about professional development, when I was at New Leaders for Schools, we used to always say this, one of my favorite quotes, I don't know where it comes from, but it is, the answer is always in the room.

(09:35):

And when you think about it, I don't care what problem educators have, if you get them together, somebody has the answer and they can solve it. So the problem is we don't often have the structures that allow educators to even come together amongst themselves to unpack and solve those kind of problems. To me, that's professional development. It doesn't require an outside entity. And again, teachers engage in professional development all the time, the amount of time they spend at night, at home, next door, next door, teacher mentors. So I think that's a great question that it's a formal thing, but it's also an informal thing that's just ingrained with any educator who wants to sharpen their practice. Our goal with our professional development is really helping to change the narrative and about how you access it when you access it. And as K 12, we've been instrumental in changing the industry in online education as a whole. The way I like to describe it, we've taken down the barriers of time and space. You don't have to learn in a particular time or in a particular forum room. Classroom technology allows us to expand that. Well, the same thing can be applied to professional development, and it's happening already, and we're glad to be contributing to that work.

(10:54):

I

Nadia Johnson (10:54):

Think you touched on a good point in thinking about professional development as something like we engage in all the time. Because I feel like thinking back on that, I'm like, I think I definitely learned more from the colleagues, the teachers, the people I was working with, more so than sitting in a pd. So I think it's important to also view that as professional development, because at the end of the day, it really is

Darren Reed (11:21):

So true. You get so much from your colleagues, but again, oftentimes educators will tell you they don't even have enough time to engage with. Yeah,

Nadia Johnson (11:32):

Absolutely. So can you tell us more about strides like Professional Development Center and what you guys are doing to help teachers and professionally develop teachers in this space?

Darren Reed (11:47):

Yeah, absolutely. I'm excited about this part. So the Strive PD is an ever-growing on-demand library of mobile-friendly courses that really allow educators to learn anytime and anywhere. We're content agnostic, meaning we know we don't have the flavor of the day, or this silver bullet will solve your challenges because we know educators everywhere need everything, right? At different times. So our goal is to have an ever-growing library of content that is easily accessible. One thing I'm really excited about is that it's not a PowerPoint for 45 minutes and somebody's talking over it, right? We've been really intentional about how we've designed our courses. So it's a mix between watching some live video, listening and also reading, right? And there are assessments built in. You get a certification or certificate at the end of each course, but the idea is that you can start it. Let's say I kids are gone.

(12:47):

I have about 30 minutes I want to unwind. Let me hop on my phone and start this course right? 10 minutes later, okay. Or as we talk, Holly, in the dmv, let's say traffic has gone. Now, you want to get in your car, go home after you put the kids to bed. Now you can hop back on your laptop and do pd. The idea is that they don't have to be time bound by pd. So again, it's an ever-growing repository of high quality courses. The other thing I want to point out about the PD Center is that we have amassed over two plus decades, thousands of training assets that are being developed into courses that will live on our site. But we also are partnering with subject matter experts around the country. Again, to our point earlier, educators everywhere have, I always say, I don't care what school, you go into the country, somebody has figured something out, and we want to tap into that.

(13:39):

Whether I've been to places where nobody had better classroom management than my cafeteria manager. I mean, there's great folks doing great things. How do we tap into them and partner with them and build dynamic courses? So if you're an educator out there, if you have great practices, go to our site, strive pd center.com, go to our content partners page and fill out the form. We love to partner with you and help connect you with our designers and turn your quality content into a course. So that's essentially where we are. And I guess I should say the last thing is we're excited that you can pay a relatively small fee and have access for a year to all the courses. It's free courses, paid courses, or you can pay as low as $29 for a course. So we really thought about educators. We understand that salaries and affordability is important to 'em, so we wanted to make certain we met that need. Oh,

Holly Owens (14:34):

That's wonderful. And I know that a release came out about a month ago about that new teachers get access,

Darren Reed (14:42):

They get free access to the Stride Professional Development Center. So when they're starting out, when

Holly Owens (14:47):

They really need that support and they need that help, and they need that on demand, they're getting access for free.

Darren Reed (14:53):

Man, Holly, I'm so glad you shared that. That's awesome. Again, talking about the teacher shortage that we're facing right now as educators exit the profession, and we have a new generation of folks who spend less time in a single career and education is a part of that, but the data also shows that within the first five years, first year teachers are leaving the profession faster than any other teacher segment. So we really wanted to help get them off to a strong start. And I've been a principal, I've been in districts, and they do a good job of really helping onboard teachers and get them acclimated. We want to go further and give them another leg up in their first year, because that first year can make or break you.

Holly Owens (15:33):

So I

Darren Reed (15:34):

Really want to say this one plug, no matter where you are in the country, if you are a first year teacher, if you know a first year teacher, have them go on to our site. They get a year free access, all they have to do is put in the code that's on there to check out and they get access.

Holly Owens (15:48):

Absolutely. And it's going to be in the show notes.

Darren Reed (15:51):

Excellent.

Nadia Johnson (15:53):

That's awesome. I know that will be awesome for those first year teachers that are looking to get that extra help. I know as a first year teacher, I struggled, just thinking back on it, if I had a resource like that, I think I would've been a little bit better equipped to enter the classroom.

Darren Reed (16:15):

Absolutely.

Holly Owens (16:16):

Yeah. Just staying a week ahead of them in the content and learning. I mean, higher education doesn't prepare you for the real thing. Even

Darren Reed (16:25):

Though

Holly Owens (16:25):

You do student teaching, I feel like there's a lot more to it than that small little experience that you get student teaching.

Darren Reed (16:35):

We Just talked about that, Holly, and when, even fortunately, I went to High Room College, so I want to give them a shout out years and years and years ago in Ohio, but they got it right before my student teaching. I was constantly in the field in various experiences, whether it was short periods of time or longer periods of time. And then when I did my student teaching, it all came together. But for many schools and students, unfortunately, their first time in the classroom is their student teaching experience. And God forbid, they have a horrible experience and then they are entered into the profession. So you hit on a great point. Schools of education or teacher prep programs, the more they can have teacher or teacher candidates in the classroom experiencing different school communities, different grade levels, it's only going to give them a better heads up when they get in the classroom.

Holly Owens (17:27):

Absolutely.

Darren Reed (17:28):

Absolutely.

Holly Owens (17:30):

So you're already doing some awesome stuff and giving that free access to new teachers. Is there anything that you have upcoming that you can share without violating any N D A or be secretive agreements that you can share with the audience or any goals that you have at the Stride Professional Center that you can share?

Darren Reed (17:51):

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, our goal is we want to get as many teachers. We have over 3 million teachers in the country. We want to get as many on our platform as possible. We really want the Stride PD Center to be a one-stop shop for your PD needs. Again, you have our courses, but in addition to our courses, you have takeaway resources within every course. And also our team has curated. So for example, instructional practices, not only do you get our course and the associated documents and templates, we've also curated free resources on the web, and that's on our site as well. So you have access to all of that. And the plug here I want to put is that we also want to connect educators around the nation, your grade level, your classroom, your school, your district, your state. You're part of a teacher cohort, but technology allows you to connect with educators everywhere. So we have an annual Promising Practices Virtual conference that happens every year. It's March 1st, 2024. We will be blasting, you can see some information on our website right now about it, but we are doing massive marketing promotion for this, and we'll call for proposals, keynote speakers, we'll have virtual vendors. It'll be really exciting. So more to come on that, but go to our site and put March 1st, 2024 in your calendar for promising practices from Strive Professional Development Center.

Holly Owens (19:14):

Awesome. We'll put that in the show notes too so everybody can link out and bookmark it so they're prepared for March, like feels like right around the corner. Honestly, it's like we just started Q four, but I feel like the rest of this is going to fly by, Especially

Darren Reed (19:32):

With the holidays forthcoming and fall. Oh, yeah. Moves quickly. Yeah,

Holly Owens (19:36):

Absolutely. I want to ask you another question. Out of all the professional development opportunities, the on-demand things, all the resources you offer, do you have any favorites that you want to share? Or ones that you're like, we just really went all in here and people should definitely go look at this one. I don't want you to play favorites, but I kind do. I put you on the spot

Nadia Johnson (19:56):

Here, Darren, and

Holly Owens (19:58):

I apologize, but I love, what do you like?

Darren Reed (20:02):

I like so many. I will say our, and I will not play favorites. I know my designers probably somewhere listening to this.

(20:11):

So there's a lot that goes in both our free courses as well as our paid courses. And I think targeted instruction is one of our most popular courses. But I'll share one course that's my personal favorite. It may not be the most dynamic, and it's one of our free courses, but it's called Problem of Practice. And essentially, I'll try to sum it really quickly, but it it's, it's a protocol. The problem of Practice Consultancy Protocol created by the Annenberg Institute and some other folks in the nineties, but it was around what we talked about, getting folks in the room and helping them each other solve the challenges. And it describes a protocol that teachers can use together, principals and school leaders can use together. And you exercise this protocol, and what it does is a single person would bring a problem to their peers. Their peers serve as the consultancy group, and you walk away with really strong takeaway actions to help you with whatever challenge you're facing. Not only does it help the person with the problem, but it helps everybody because everybody has those similar issues. So there is a free course on our site that walks you through the problem of practice consultancy protocol. Again, the answer is in the room. And this helps get the right people in the room to solve problems because PD doesn't live outside of the education space. It lives with those who are doing the work. And that's a course that speaks to that, but many good ones on there.

Holly Owens (21:37):

Yeah, that one sounds like Sounds

Nadia Johnson (21:39):

Interesting.

Darren Reed (21:40):

Yeah, I learned that it really was exposed to that at New Leaders for New Schools, and I've seen it in face-to-face with a room full of 200 school leaders, and I've even done it online, and it's equally as powerful, but a cool protocol. Awesome.

Holly Owens (21:55):

Awesome. We're going to link that on the show notes too.

Darren Reed (21:58):

Excellent. Yeah, there's

Nadia Johnson (21:59):

Going to be lots everywhere. Yeah, A lot of cool resources to share. That's awesome. So kind coming to a close, is there

Darren Reed (22:09):

Anything

Nadia Johnson (22:10):

That we missed? Anything else that you want to share about Stride PD Center or the work that you're doing?

Darren Reed (22:18):

Yeah, I think what's the only thing I'll do here, and I'll plug Stride is such an amazing organization. We are obviously help innovate the online education space for students, but we now are beyond just the K through 12, we're into adult learning, and we have Stride Professional Development Center, we have Stride Tutoring, we have Learning Hub. I really am excited 31 years in, hopefully you can even hear the excitement in my voice because we're really contributing to Schools of Tomorrow helping to innovate education. And so even as much as I'm excited about the Stride PD Center, and I hope everybody goes to sign up, even if it's a free account or paid account, I really encourage folks to look at the suite of offerings and resources we provide for educators in schools from Stride as a whole. It's a really cool time for us, and I wish I could plug each of my colleagues in their businesses, but it's a Great, well, they need to come on the show, or we need to do

Holly Owens (23:17):

Something live as a

Darren Reed (23:18):

Panel. Everybody

Nadia Johnson (23:20):

The

Holly Owens (23:20):

Opportunity to talk about their line of business and what they're doing, and then we'll

Darren Reed (23:25):

See all the connections and how everything

Holly Owens (23:27):

Flows, How

Nadia Johnson (23:28):

Everything works together. Yeah, indeed,

Darren Reed (23:31):

Indeed would love that.

Holly Owens (23:34):

Awesome. Well, last question for you, and this is a big one. We want to know from you, what do you think in your 31 experiences, what does the future of education look like?

Darren Reed (23:45):

Where

Holly Owens (23:45):

Are we going? I love this question. Me too.

Darren Reed (23:49):

Such a great question. I won't belabor. We know that education as far as it's come and it's come a long way and there's some really cool things happening. There's still some antiquated parts of the system that we can adapt to and get to. But I think the biggest impact is the advent of AI and technology and us embracing that in the most positive way. When we do that, I think it allows us to be more efficient in how we teach, how students learn, how we not only close the achievement gap from the lowest students to the middle of the pack, but the gap that we often always talk about and miss, and that's from students where they are who are not low and what their potential is. I think it allows us to really differentiate in an unbelievable way. So I think education of the future is such that really, and I will say this, it can be scary often for teachers.

(24:52):

I think it elevates the role of educators even more so because teachers don't want to teach to test. Not that that's what they're doing, but they really want to engage and find out who kids are individually and use technology and resources to help all of them. That's what educators want. So I think schools of tomorrow are going to equip not only teachers, but schools with that technology and how we are ready to meet that need is going to determine the future of school. So I'm excited about it and hope the PD Center is a great way to help get us there.

Holly Owens (25:25):

Absolutely. I'm sure it's going to be a catalyst for that. I

Darren Reed (25:30):

Think so. Indeed, indeed.

Holly Owens (25:33):

Well, we can't thank you enough, Darren, for coming on the show and sharing your excitement about the education space and all the different things you're doing at the Stride Professional Development Center. We look forward to seeing what's coming up for the year.

Darren Reed (25:48):

Likewise. No, I really appreciate this. I look forward to the podcast airing, and if any questions, folks can reach out to us on the PD Center site. Awesome.

Holly Owens (25:58):

Well, thank you so much. Thank

Darren Reed (25:59):

You so much.