NECC ’09 Reflections: What Just Happened?

1. Tom
   July 17, 2009 at 1:59 pm | Permalink

   I actually had very similar thoughts after NECC09 but couldn’t articulate them as well as you did. Not only were there limited sessions on leadership or policy, but interest is definitely more geared towards classroom practice. I went to sessions based on web 2.0 tools that attracted over 300 people compared to a session on the Nat’l Ed Tech Plan which maybe 50 people attended. I guess it just confirms that most attendees are school or district level folks. I kept thinking that there were great sessions on integrating new, purposeful technology and yet it will probably only result in isolated/grass-roots led pockets of innovation across schools since there is no big picture thinking.

2. Ed Jones
   July 23, 2009 at 10:56 am | Permalink

   Jon, great observations. just one problem:

   Bringing Leadership to education is a problem of culture. We can’t change that by changing a few conferences. We can talk about it, but the legal structure impedes any real change.

   The problem is encapsulated in the title of your next post: Politics Education.

   Until we create a structure where professionalism trumps politics with the state and national teachers organizations, we’re doomed. Leadership (technical, pedagogical, or personal) will be trumped by partisan politics. When education “leaders” spend their time doing partisan politics, while education lives in one-party rule; while 85% of teachers side with the left wing of the country, we can’t focus on leadership and building first class organizations.

   Don’t talk to NECC about this issue. Talk to legislators who mandate collective bargaining.

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