Even the most enthusiastic educator needs support. Consider Sasha, who had always prided herself on staying current with classroom innovations. But AI felt different — every week, a new tool, a new headline, a new debate. So when her district advertised a two-hour webinar called “Using Generative AI to Save Time on Lesson Planning,” she registered immediately. The session was fast-paced and lively. Sasha took notes, watched a few impressive demos, and left with a folder full of slides and three sample prompts she promised herself she’d try.
Three weeks later, those prompts were still sitting in her downloads folder.
Between planning lessons, grading essays, mentoring new teachers and responding to families, Sasha simply didn’t have the time or ongoing support to translate that single workshop into sustained classroom practice. When she attempted to use a generative AI tool to scaffold a text for multilingual learners, she wasn’t sure whether the output was pedagogically sound or if her inputs were safe. Without coaching or follow-ups with peers, the initial enthusiasm faded into uncertainty.
Sasha’s story is fictional, but it reflects a national reality. A new State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) guide — Improving Professional Learning Systems to Better Support Today’s Educators: How Title II, Part A Offers a Model for State and Local Leadership — offers a road map for developing solutions. Published in partnership with FullScale, ISTE+ASCD and Learning Forward, the guide provides evidence-based recommendations and examples from across the country to help leaders redesign professional learning (PL) systems, especially as they navigate rising expectations around AI.
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT EFFORTS CURRENTLY FALL SHORT
To understand the current context of PL, we conducted a national survey, as well as two virtual and one in-person focus groups with state and local education agency leaders. Across these conversations, four systemic issues repeatedly surfaced:
- A lack of shared definitions for tech-integrated instruction: Without a clear definition of what high-quality, technology-enhanced instruction looks like, states and districts default to ad hoc training driven by vendor availability rather than instructional priorities.
- Short-term spending that prioritizes tool training: Funds are often spent on short-term training on specific platforms or applications. These sessions may meet immediate needs, such as rollout of a newly procured tool, but rarely build durable educator capacity.
- Data focused on participation, not improvement: States and districts track educator attendance and satisfaction in training, but rarely gather evidence of instructional change, such as classroom artifacts, student work or changes in teacher decision-making.
- Pockets of excellence with limited pathways to scale: Although strong models exist across the country, states often lack the structures needed to document, adapt and scale these models.
These issues are not unique to AI implementation contexts, but the rapid growth of AI-powered tools has made them more visible and more urgent. Educators want clarity, support and time to make sense of AI and other ed tech’s instructional role. Without improvements in systems that invest in PL, states and districts risk defaulting to the same pattern Sasha experienced — a single workshop, followed by uncertainty, followed by stagnation.
BUILDING PROFESSIONAL LEARNING SYSTEMS DESIGNED FOR TRANSFORMATION
Drawing from the guide and successful examples across the country, here are six steps state and local education agencies can act on immediately.
- Publish and communicate a shared statewide vision for high-quality, tech-integrated instruction.
States can accelerate coherence by defining their vision for teaching and learning — aligned to frameworks like the ISTE Standards, Universal Design for Learning and state instructional priorities — and clarifying what effective tech-integrated instruction looks like, including how tools powered by AI can support broader pedagogical goals. Embedding this definition in grant guidance and PL expectations ensures every funded activity has a common instructional anchor. - Align funding around priorities using braided budgets.
Instead of funding individual workshops, leaders can use PL funds, such as Title II-A of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, to support multiyear PL pathways, including instructional coaching positions, professional learning communities (PLC) facilitation, collaborative inquiry cycles and ongoing AI pedagogy cohorts. The Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction provides a model for how different funding streams can be braided toward common district-level goals. - Transform monitoring and compliance into opportunities for improvement.
Compliance monitoring is essential for program integrity and public trust; but when limited to checking boxes, it misses the chance to strengthen practice. The Wyoming Innovator Network offers a compelling model, where districts upload short videos, lesson artifacts and student work that help the state education agency (SEA) understand implementation — not for punitive compliance, but to identify bright spots and inform statewide support. States can build on such models by requesting evidence-of-practice artifacts in grant reporting, turning monitoring into a lever for continuous improvement. - Prioritize durable PL models over one-and-done sessions.
The research is clear: Coaching, PLCs and embedded inquiry produce far more lasting instructional change than one-off workshops alone. AI integration is particularly well-suited to these models, because teachers need cycles of practice, feedback and refinement. Districts like Denver Public Schools have led here by prioritizing sustained coaching as a required component of participation in technology training. - Elevate ed-tech leadership and cross-functional decision-making.
Districts like Claremont Unified in California demonstrate how powerful it is when instructional technology, curriculum, data and PL teams work together. Their cross-functional department ensures technology purchases, implementation and PL plans are all aligned to instructional priorities. This prevents the “tool-chasing” dynamic that often overwhelms teachers. - Document, highlight and scale what works.
Pockets of excellence exist across states, but without a deliberate system to document and share them, they often remain isolated. SEA leaders can highlight and promote examples of high-quality PL focused on effective technology use to improve instruction. Virginia has begun this work by launching an Office of Excellence and Best Practices in charge of and sharing proven strategies, fostering collaboration across the state, and ensuring that high-quality resources are quickly scalable and accessible to all educators.
WHY THIS WORK MATTERS MORE THAN EVER
According to recent survey data from Education Week, teacher exposure to AI training is increasing, but overwhelmingly through one-off sessions, not the ongoing, job-embedded PL supported by research. State and local education leaders now face a pressing question — How do we turn the current wave of interest and concerns around AI and emerging ed tech into meaningful, equitable and sustained improvements in teaching and learning? Education leaders can use the recommendations in the new SETDA guide to build modern PL systems that match the pace of today’s classroom realities.
Download the full guide here.
AUTHOR BIOS
Michael Ham is a partner at FullScale, leading policy initiatives to foster equity-driven innovation in K-12 education. He collaborates with sector leaders nationwide to create conditions that enable transformative learning and equitable access for all students. Michael’s career in K-12 education began in high-need Title I public schools, where he scaled impactful instructional practices alongside school and district leaders. His passion for human-centered systems improvement and leveraging technology evolved into leading broader systemic change efforts. As a partner of Research & Policy at FullScale, he works with state and federal leaders to implement programs that scale evidence-based practices, focusing on sustainable models that prioritize equity and empower students.
Beth Holland is managing director of Research & Policy at FullScale. Since joining FullScale, she has expanded the organization’s initiatives, building research partnerships with districts, systems and other organizations to engage in program evaluation as well as specific areas of interest. She is a nationally recognized expert and thought leader in the ed-tech and digital equity spaces, recently serving on a Technical Working Group to author the 2024 National Educational Technology Plan (NETP). Prior to joining FullScale, she completed a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Rhode Island, where she worked on a project funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s Ready to Learn Initiative, and served as the digital equity and rural project director at the Consortium of School Networking (CoSN).
Ji Soo Song is the director of projects and initiatives at SETDA, where he oversees a portfolio of initiatives to support 40+ state education agencies implementing promising practices on topics such as digital opportunity, ed-tech procurement, professional learning, sustainability and AI. He leads SETDA’s partnerships with philanthropic groups and corporate sponsors and advises the organization’s federal advocacy strategies. Ji Soo also oversees the design and evaluation of SETDA’s signature events and represents state leaders in national and international forums, including as a designated focal point for the UNESCO-UNICEF Gateways to Public Digital Learning Initiative. Previously, Ji Soo served as a digital equity advisor and Federation of American Scientists Impact Fellow at the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology. He led the department’s efforts to bridge the digital access divide, organized the National Digital Equity Summit, and supported development of the 2024 National Educational Technology Plan.
