Michael Smith is a National Board Certified Teacher. In addition to teaching high school English, he has served in a variety of siteleadership positions over the last fifteen years in the Santa Clarita Valley, north of Los Angeles, California – these include Intervention Coordinator, an accreditation-team chairperson, and the English 10 Lead Teacher. He has also served as a member on site technology, restructuring, staff-development, and leadership committees. On the district-level, Michael has been involved in writing district curriculum guides, evaluating textbook adoptions, and coordinating the development of district benchmark assessments. Most prominently, he spent ten years as a Professional Development Trainer, writing curriculum and training hundreds of district teachers on best practices designed to improve student achievement. More recently, he has served his school site as a Professional Development Coach, leading both new and veteran teachers in the creation of site professional learning communities. Michael is also involved with both local and national associations, such as the California Association of Teachers of English (CATE) and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), where he has learned directly from leading education experts, authors, and consultants. Over the last several years, he has utilized his experience and knowledge in presenting for the California League of High School’s annual conference and twice at the Staff Development for Educators’ National Conference on Differentiation. He is currently in the process of launching Master Teacher Tools, a resource website dedicated to sharing and promoting research-based best practices.