Host Dr. Alison Leveque introduces the READ podcast and a conversation about effective professional development (PD), The Windward School’s PD structures, the “Mississippi Miracle,” and current PD trends. Betsy MacDermott-Duffy shares the COMPASS framework for research-based PD: tying learning to content, making it ongoing, modeling with metacognition, active participation, advice/feedback through coaching, shared collaboration, and self-reflection, emphasizing student outcomes and fragile transfer without sustained support. Colleen McGlynn describes Windward’s layered PD system, including assistant teacher training, weekly Friday PD, and monthly content meetings guided by teacher needs, coordinator coaching, and research trends, with time to practice and follow up. Dana Carr-Ford and Kinjal Nicholls discuss Mississippi’s fourth-grade reading gains, attributing success to structured literacy, preservice reform, universal screening, strong accountability including a third-grade gate, and sustained training, then highlight growing focus on writing, executive function, AI limits for struggling readers, and emerging “math wars.”

00:00 Podcast Welcome

00:38 Meet Betsy MacDermott-Duffy

01:26 Why PD Often Fails

02:29 COMPASS Content Focus

04:50 Ongoing Follow Up

07:26 Modeling In Action

09:32 Practice And Participation

10:34 Feedback And Coaching

11:49 Collaboration And Reflection

16:34 Top PD Researchers

19:05 Windward PD Workshops Plug

19:18 Meet Colleen McGlynn At Windward

20:23 How Windward Plans PD

25:01 Measuring Impact And Iterating

28:35 Advice For Busy Teachers

30:39 Five Strategies Takeaway

31:28 Mississippi Miracle Explained

34:06 Marathon Mindset and PD

35:10 Accountability and Third Grade Gate

37:25 Structured Literacy Framework

38:35 Applying Lessons to New York

41:53 Writing Instruction Returns

44:42 Executive Function Skills

46:04 AI Limits in Learning Support

48:00 Math Wars and Explicit Teaching

49:39 PD Takeaways and Call to Action

51:47 Closing Summary and Courses

Produced by The Windward Institute, a division of The Windward School (NY).

www.thewindwardschool.org/wi