Education Week - August 20, 2014 - Special Report - (Page 9)

CALENDAR OF EVENTS ARTICLES points, while simultaneously expressing pride at the reflective man he's turned into-and that was beautiful to watch. * eld in a setting where relationships could be renewed, distractions minimized. Sleeping on an iron camp bed and sharing communal sinks were part of the experience-but the homemade food was incredible and the late-night, wine-fueled conversation rich. * Low-cost driven by participants needs and goals, rather than big names or sponsorships from organizations with programs and materials to sell. *  safe atmosphere in which to wrestle with thorny issues, argue, or change one's mind-or simply take a walk together, down to the lake. * esigned to connect rather than instruct. The amazing teacherfilmmaker Amy Valens was there to share the story of Mission Hill School in Boston, and the general response from participants was: In what ways are they different from us? The same as us? What ideas can we adapt? What can we learn from them? Not: Here are the reasons we can't do that. I was there to present on teacher leadership. I was prepared to share dramatic, even shocking information about the staggering gap between custom-tailored teaching practice and state and federal policy. I planned to tell them about teacher leadership "programs"-where "leaders" are selected and trained and funded, to do the bidding of organizations and promote policy initiatives. I wanted to talk about role-based leaders with defined duties, contrasted with a more organic kind of leadership-leadership that emerges from place and need. That-it suddenly struck me-was present, in spades, in the room already. Authentic Leadership A principal who enthusiastically attends a conference planned entirely by her teachers, to learn with them? Teachers who won't let their internally designed spring weekend together die after three decades? Precious time set aside to talk about things that matter most in serving the 500 children in their collective care, as educators and parents? If that's not natural and authentic leadership, I don't know what is. Laszlo Bock, Google's senior vice president of people operations, revealed in a recent article what the company looks for in a job candidate-and it has nothing to with grade point average or former job titles. It is: "Leadership-in particular emergent leadership as opposed to traditional leadership. Traditional leadership is, were you president of the chess club? Were you vice president of sales? How quickly did you get there? We don't care. What we care about is, when faced with a problem and you're a member of a team, do you, at the appropriate time, step in and lead? And just as critically, do you step back and stop leading, do you let someone else? Because what's critical to be an effective leader in this environment is you have to be willing to relinquish power." At the end of the weekend, I was chatting with an Open School teacher who shared that she had a tendency to look for stressed parents in grocery store checkout lines, amusing their babies and toddlers by making faces, gesturing and perhaps saying a word or two. "I've been teaching kids forever," she said. "I know how to help." Professional leadership. Grown, tended, modeled, and nurtured. Simple as that. I Nancy Flanagan is an education consultant and former National Boardcertified teacher. She also writes the Teacher in a Strange Land blog: www.edweek.org/go/flanagan. This article originally appeared on Education Week Teacher March 25, 2014. Unleash the Power of Apple in the classroom bons (a recognized symbol for raising awareness of sexual assault) at conferences, and other means. For his part, Mr. Lewis now says that both he and ISTE are "sensitive and committed" to addressing issues of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and misogyny in the ed-tech community. He expressed regret that he and ISTE were not made aware of Ms. Norling's allegations earlier, and said he would have been "eager" to respond to them more quickly. Though not everyone in educational technology supports the type of detailed codes of conduct advocated by the Ada Initiative, ISTE's new guidelines were in effect for this year's conference. James Louis, the president of Best Meetings Inc., a Bloomington, Minn.-based company that provides meeting-planning services, described such policies as a necessary "risk management" strategy, especially for organizers of events that bring together large numbers of people from different companies and institutions. Such policies can not only protect conference organizers against being held liable for incidents that occur at their events, he said, but also ensure that victims are treated appropriately. It is especially important, Mr. Louis said, that conference staff members be trained to provide victims with options for responding to incidents and to support them in the choices they make. I A version of this article originally appeared online June 19, 2014. EDUCATION WEEK 2014 CALENDAR OF EVENTS & PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT DIRECTORY www.edweek.org/go/calendar 9 With Casper Suite and its free iOS app, Casper Focus, schools have the industry's easiest way to manage all of their Apple devices-and faculty and students can take advantage of the rich educational ecosystem that only the Apple platform o ers Casper Suite and Casper Focus let educators and IT: * Reduce lost instructional time by quickly transitioning students' iPads from one app or website to another * Leverage Apple's enhanced Volume Purchase Program * Personalize devices to each individual's needs * nventory image con gure secure and distribute software and apps without ever touching the device * Administer quizzes and exams in a secure iPad based assessment environment * Distribute eBooks easily To learn more, call 612-605-6625 or visit www.jamfsoftware.com/edweek http://www.edweek.org/go/flanagan http://www.jamfsoftware.com/edweek http://www.jamfsoftware.com/edweek http://www.edweek.org/go/calendar

Education Week - August 20, 2014 - Special Report

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Education Week - August 20, 2014 - Special Report