In a study of teachers’ responses to professional development, Garet (2001) reported
that teachers identified a focus on content knowledge as the component of professional
development that had the greatest effect on their practice. The other component which
teachers identified as impacting their practice was the extent to which the professional
development was “coherent.” This referred to professional development experiences
that were cumulative and built on prior knowledge, were aligned with the Standards
to which teachers were held accountable, and provided opportunities to communicate
with peers who were engaged in similar efforts to improve their practice. The professional
development activities provided in this STEM initiative had all of these elements and will
be described in detail in a subsequent section of this paper.