The purpose of this planning guide is to assist state, local, and university personnel involved in the design, development, and evaluation of staff development or other areas of school improvement. It represents a compilation of the learnings from the National Inservice Network's project work in Colorado, Indiana, and Maine from 1978-1981. Each state designed a statewide planning process or model to assist local administrators and teachers of regular and special education to come together to plan, implement, and exchange staff development activities. Fundamental to the planning process was local ownership, problem solving, ongoing structures, resources, and collaboration. This guide provides information on strategies that may be used in team development, needs assessment, program development, program evaluation, and implementation. Sections contain information on concerns of users of this guide about: (1) the model; (2) principles that form the basis for the model; (3) goals of the model; (4) users of this model; (5) needs that are addressed in the planning process; (6) other purposes that are served by the planning process; (7) requirements for implementing the model; (8) how local agencies are identified and selected; (9) kind of training needed for a core training team; (10) how participants are identified and selected to be part of the local planning team; (11) instructional topics and strategies used; (12) how instructional sessions are provided; (13) what follows planning; (14) what is needed to implement and maintain the plan; (15) how the model is evaluated; and (16) how the effort might be funded. (JD)