Strong professional communities hold several potential advantages for schools: 

• increased responsibility for performance of students and teachers, increased personal commitment to work 
• self-regulation instead of bureaucratic, rule-based control of teacher behavior a climate of inquiry, and 
• innovation leading to greater organizational learning and effectiveness.         

The direct outcomes of increased professional community for individual teachers can be categorized under three broad, yet related, headings: 

• an increased sense of efficacy relating to work that results in increased motivation in the classroom; 
• an increased sense of satisfaction with the personal dignity of work; and 
• increased sense of responsibility for student development and achievement. 

Increased Efficacy:  Teachers’ sense of affiliation with each other and the school, their mutual support and individual responsibility for the effectiveness of instruction increases through collaboration with peers (Louis, 1992). Emergent professional communities increase opportunities to improve classroom practice by expanding the number and quality of feedback mechanisms available to teachers. In general, teachers will only seek out and accept serious reviews of their work when staff relationships are open and supportive. Thus, the importance of frequent reactions to performance from peers and supportive school leaders is a consequence of its strong relationship to sense of efficacy among teachers (Louis and Smith, 1992). Sense of efficacy is, in turn, related to collaboration and personal commitment to teaching and students (Louis, 1997). 

Satisfaction Emerging From Personal Dignity:  One issue that frequently arises when teachers’ talk about work is the discouragement many of them feel when they believe that their best efforts are neither respected nor valued by peers, supervisors, or the public. Professional community, on the other hand, is strongly associated with teachers’ sense of influence over their school. This may occur because some strategies for increasing teacher influence validate teachers’ perception of their own value as social agents. Newmann (1991), for example, suggests that giving teachers more individual autonomy, discretion and control in conducting their work encourages a greater sense of ownership of and responsibility for quality in student learning. Johnson (1990) suggests that teachers obtain the greatest satisfaction from empowerment that focuses on teachers and classrooms; teachers view involvement in policy-setting which is not directly related to their own work as a distraction. 

Responsibility for Student Learning:  All professionals are expected to be responsible for the quality of their own work. Good teachers, for example, typically view themselves as accountable for their students’ learning, even when there are no external systems that would hold them up to some performance standard. However, this personal sense of accountability is not always sufficient to maintain a focus on how well the school ultimately serves the needs of students (Mitchell, 1993). However, when individual responsibility in the classroom is combined with other strategies for improving collective teachers’ work, it appears to contribute to teachers’ collective sense of responsibility for student learning (Lee and Smith, 1996; Louis, Marks and Kruse, 1996). Many feel that in addition to becoming more effective at collective learning, schools must become stronger professional communities if they are to restructure (Louis and Kruse, 1995; Bryk, Lee and Holland; 1993). Professional communities in schools are characterized by five conditions which, including collaboration, emphasize the need for teachers to work together: 

Shared norms and values:  Members of the school community affirm through language and action their common assumptions about children, learning, teaching and teachers’ roles, the importance of interpersonal connection, and commitment to the collective good (Bryk, Lee and Holland, 1993). 

Reflective dialogue:  Reflection promotes teachers’ awareness of their practice and its consequences for student development. Commitment to reflection as a communal activity means regular conversation among teachers focusing on the academic, curricular, and instructional concerns of practice within the school, as well as on issues of student development and progress (Zeichner and Tabachnick, 1991). 

De-privatization of practice:  Teachers within professional communities are committed to making the private work of their classrooms public. They share and trade-off the roles of mentor, advisor or specialist when providing or receiving assistance from peers (Lieberman, Saxl & Miles, 1988). Sharing experiences in creating classroom environments that promote resilience among students is an important aspect of this mutually supportive behavior. 

Collective focus on student learning:  Teachers’ discussion and action centers on opportunities for students to learn and seeks to enhance student benefit (Darling-Hammond and Goodwin, 1993). 

Collaboration:  Collaboration, or the exchange of expertise, is a natural outgrowth of reflective dialogue and deprivatized practice. Collaborative efforts enhance shared understandings and reinforce the mosaic of relationships within the school that enhance teacher resiliency (Little, 1990). 

While teachers may be involved already in small, rewarding professional communities within their school, or with colleagues from other schools (Talbert and McLaughlin, 1993), when schools attempt significant reform (such as efforts to promote resiliency among students), it is critical to form professional communities and collaboration among all teachers in that building (Louis and Kruse, 1995). 

The design of the school as a work setting either nourishes or impedes the formation of a strong professional community. Several structural conditions are necessary to create supportive communities that allow teachers to focus on student resilience. In addition to the creation of work spaces for teachers, environments must also be created that are socially supportive of teachers’ efforts as well. To develop schools that support teachers, it is important to consider the following school improvements. 

Time to meet, plan, and talk:  Time is not only necessary to carry out the agenda of change, it is essential if innovation and the development of caring communities of learning are to be maintained. Teachers must be provided the means to meet on a daily basis to address issues of concern for teachers, departments, grade levels or teams. 

Physical proximity:  Creating common work spaces, such as team planning rooms, is one way to provide relief from the classroom isolation and pressured work schedules found in most school buildings. Moreover, when teachers are physically close, occasions for sustained observations and conversations related to teaching and student learning increase. 

Communication structures:  Creating school-wide professional community with a focus on students requires structures that encourage exchange of ideas within and across boundaries of grade level, subject matter, or departments. Regular meetings focused on teaching and learning allow faculty to discuss instruction and curriculum, personal and professional growth, and to exchange of ideas. 

Trust and respect:  Trust and respect from colleagues and key external communities such as parents and the district office staff, are necessary conditions for developing commitment to school goals. Trust is an essential ingredient of collegiality because it induces a sense of loyalty, commitment and effectiveness necessary to maintain a shared focus on students. 

Supportive leadership: Good leaders are crucial for organizational innovation. They encourage the professional community to think in ways that deviate from the current culture. Principals who focus on student learning and performance demonstrate that pedagogy is important which, in turn, supports the expectation that conversations around these issues are important and worthy. 

As teachers become better able to create environments within schools that support their own learning they can, in turn, become more supportive of the emotional, social and academic needs of students. While this assertion may seem obvious it is, in many ways, counter to conventional isolationist structures in schools. In fact, studies connecting teachers’ sense of responsibility for student development to improved student performance and more resilient behavior are rare in education (See Louis, Marks, & Kruse, in press; for one study that investigates this connection). 

However, we believe that teachers’ increased sense of influence and control over student learning is likely to improve student performance and a student’s ability to stay in school. Our work has been carried out in urban school settings across the United States, and an in-depth sample in Chicago. In these schools, many children are "at risk" of school failure, and teachers must confront their students’ needs for emotional support and life survival skills that leave them either numb or intensely committed. The research discussed here suggests that creating a resilient and energized teacher work force requires creating new working conditions that promote individual job satisfaction and school level professional communities. As teachers begin to feel increased personal responsibility for student experiences in school, they will need to rely on the support and skills of colleagues. The development of school-wide professional communities provides teachers with an intellectual and social support system that fosters their own professional development, and enables them to provide the experiences and school environment that students need to develop resiliency.