Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn
Catholic Education Office

School Determined Professional Development Allocation

Related Policies:

Nil

Purpose:

The Catholic Education Office allocates funds to ACT and NSW primary schools and NSW Secondary/Central Schools annually to support the professional development of teachers.

This allocation allows schools to:

• Receive relief funding to release teachers from teaching duties for specific professional development purposes.
• Provide for school based professional development (ie for whole staff, staff teams or individual staff members).
• Access external training programs.
• Attend conferences and seminars.

Policy:

Principals and School Professional Development Committees will implement the following procedures in order to access the allocation.

Records of professional development activities either for individual staff or full staff are to be maintained by the school to support the expenditure of the allocation.

Definitions:

SDPD - School Determined Professional Development

SDPD Committee – School committee established to make recommendations to the Principal regarding professional development allocation to members of staff.

Request for Relief Approval - Form used to apply for funds to employ a relief teacher in order to replace a staff member attending a Professional Learning activity not listed on the CEO Professional Learning Calendar.

Procedures:

1. The Principal, following consultation with the SDPD Committee, approves an application from either an individual staff member or for a full staff activity. A record of such activity must be maintained by the school for accountability purposes, ie for salaries, leave. It is the Principal's responsibility to advise the Catholic Education Office if a staff member does not attend such planned activities.

1.1 SDPD funds for individual schools are retained by the CEO and may be accessed in the following ways:

1.1.1 the Principal requests reimbursement for an account paid by the school for a particular professional development activity;
1.1.2  the Principal requests payment of an account directly from the CEO allocation by providing a tax invoice from the facilitator/supplier;
1.1.3 The Principal requests the payment of a casual teacher to cover the replacement of the teacher attending professional development.

1.2 Request for Relief Approval form is to be sent to the CEO for funds to employ a relief teacher in order to replace a staff member attending a Professional learning activity not listed on the CEO Professional Learning Calendar.

1.3 Where a school plans to conduct a full staff activity necessitating a pupil free day, the following are to be given at least four weeks notice of the intention and the date of the Professional Development activity:

• The Parish Priest.
• Parents/School Board.
• The Transport Department where school buses are required.
• Other persons providing services to the school eg; counsellors.

1.4 The school, for reporting purposes, should maintain an evaluation of Individual professional development activities.

1.5 Each school term, the Catholic Education Office will provide individual schools with a report on their budget allocation detailing salary and non-salary expenditure.

1.6 Unspent funds at the end of each year will not be carried forward unless a school determines that a specific project nominated for the following year requires additional funds to be committed to it. Request for funds for such a project will need to be notified in advance to the Director of Catholic Education, i.e. by Term 3 of the current year.

1.7 Schools which exceed their annual SDPD allocation will be required to reimburse the CEO this over expenditure.

References:

Nil

Forms:

Request for Relief Approval (For those activities not listed on the CEO Professional Learning
Calendar).
SDPD Reimbursement Form

Last updated on April 13, 2007