Proposals for EduCon 2.3 are due the day after tomorrow so, as always, I’m down to almost the last minute finishing mine.
However, unlike most other conferences, they aren’t looking for people to stand up in front of a group to do a demonstration/lecture/slide show.
EduCon all about conversations and a real exchange of ideas, which makes the conference far more interesting than more conventional meetings, but also makes it harder to design a session proposal, at least it does for me.
So, I’m going to lay out what I’ve been thinking of submitting and maybe someone can let me know if I’m on the right track or totally off kilter. The sound of crickets might also be a good indicator.
This idea for this session stems from the fact that I work in an overly-large school district, something like the 12th largest in the country, and for all the claims by our administration of being innovative, we still need to make major changes to the way we educate our students.
But how does someone affect change in a large system, especially when you have very little direct, positional control over things?
Even in school districts much smaller than ours, and I imagine in most colleges and universities, I suspect people have found ways to “manage up” or have developed an active underground in order to inject new ideas.
What’s worked? How do you make lots of small changes that add up to big ones?
If this proposal is accepted, no one should attend expecting someone to provide the answers. Â I would like this to be an honest exchange of ideas that have worked where you are along with the opportunity to brainstorm more.
Incidentally, EduCon usually has the tools to allow you to participate even if you can’t be in Philadelphia so this could potentially include many more people than just those in a relatively small classroom.
Ok, so that’s the concept?
Is this a session you would want to attend? Is it something that’s not worth the effort to enter it and press the submit button? Â Should I be riding a donkey looking for a Sancho Panza?