When I first started as a part-time Technology TOSA for my district's
Induction program (formerly known as
BTSA, a program to support beginning teachers), I wasn't quite sure what my job would entail or what kind of impact I could have on my district. At the beginning of the school year, I approached the Induction Coordinator, Teresa, with my idea of inviting an
EdTechTeam speaker to our district to inspire our new teachers. After some discussion, we realized that we wanted to offer more to our teachers beyond an inspirational speaker, so we began researching
summits and
bootcamps. Several Google Hangouts with EdTechTeam discussing the various options later, we decided we wanted much more -- we wanted a little bit of everything so that all attendees can get the most out of attending this professional development opportunity which eventually led us to designing a
custom summit for our district.
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| Stacy, Teresa, and Torre |
Although the initial focus of our custom summit was to meet the needs of our first and second year teachers, we recognized that there were many other specialized groups in the district that could also benefit from the professional development being provided by the summit. In choosing the types of
sessions we wanted offered, we included a leadership strand for administrators and district leaders, Gsuite for classified personnel, math and special education specific sessions, and sessions specific to primary, elementary and secondary teachers. Our initial goal was 300 educators when we created a Google Form for attendees to register back in October. Fast forward a few months and by January, we had
437 attendees registered and a fantastic lineup of
keynote speakers and presenters.
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| photo by: Teresa Stringer |
Our summit kicked off with
Rushton Hurley's keynote on making your school something special. It really set the tone of the summit as the attendees left the keynote thinking about what makes each school in Irvine special and ultimately, what makes our district special.
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| photo by: Amanda Cramer |
As I walked around each session checking to make sure everything was working, I was in awe of the energy in each room. We had a room of administrators including directors, coordinators, and assistant superintendents listening intently to Jason Markey present on leadership using Google apps. Other sessions included teachers trying out Google Expeditions and learning about virtual reality or creating videos using Adobe Spark and WeVideo. Some teachers learned about BreakoutEDU and digital BreakoutEDU while others learned how to create their PLN and use Twitter. Saturday concluded with a high energy demo slam where different presenters shared their favorite tech tip or trick with attendees laughing along and cheering with each successful demo slam.
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| photo by: Amanda Taylor |
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| photo by: Josh Johnson |
I was also proud to see my middle school's Student Tech Team volunteering at the summit helping attendees with schedules and navigation. They were even able to attend a few sessions themselves!
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| members of the Student Tech Team |
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| members of the Student Tech Team |
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| Student Tech Team members practicing new skills learned and exploring VR with the Google Cardboard giveaway. |
Sunday was no different as
Jason Markey began the day with an inspiring keynote on how chance favors the connected school. Sessions on Sunday built upon Saturday's which allowed attendees to practice their new knowledge gained from the previous day. The energy level remained high as presenters shared about design thinking, bitmojis, and 20 Time. Time flew by and before we knew it, we were at the final keynote by
Dr. Mark Wagner inspiring all educators to be change agents and to think bigger because this was only the beginning. We left knowing that our commitment to growing as educators by attending this summit over the weekend would significantly impact our classrooms and I left inspired by Dr. Wagner's message that this summit was truly "only the beginning".
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| The summit would not have been possible with these ladies - Teresa and Torre. Huge thanks for your hard work! |
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