Intial research

I spent last week going over alot of reading that focused mainly on what creates quality staff development. They were mostly JSTOR articles from various education research journals. Two of the studies I looked at were done in England. However, I still think they're reallyl helpful because NCLB was actually influenced alot by the education policy in England. The whole accountability and high stakes testing atmosphere that has been created in the US has alot of its roots in policies that came out in England several years before NCLB. So it was interesting to hear the studies talk about the impact of 'accountability' measures and how they influenced staff development. Some of the important ideas I got from these articles was the difference between self motivated development versus enforced staff development. Teachers are less likely to integrate methods taught to them when they are not the result of less formal training. More successful methods of encouraging teachers to continue to develop their teaching methods is through informal mentoring from fellow teachers. Also academic theories were also successful when teachers then applied them in the classroom through trial and error, but the bottom line is that requiring teachers to attend staff development meetings dosn't mean it will impact their teaching style.
One of the key problems with education policy and attempts to improve teacher quality is this idea that curriculum needs to be 'teacher-proofed'. Assuming that teachers are not capable of making decisions about what affective pedagogy is. So all these curriculum ideas get forced onto a district with very little teacher input. The disconnect between the ideas behind the content makes it unlikely that teachers will accept or be able to properly teach all this new curriculum. So as I keep researching I want to focus on two things. What are successful ways to encourage ongoing development in a way that will actually create change that does not degrade a teacher's sense of professionalism. Also, I am particularly interested in teachers in low-income school districts so I also want to keep in mind what good curriculum and development should be encouraged? Even if teachers are using the methods encouraged in staff development programs dosn't mean they are good ones. So what will effective and quality staff development look like and encourage?