Field Trips: Events for Educators

June

Sparking Innovative Learning and Creativity [1]
11-14, Princeton, New Jersey

Head east to the New Media Consortium's Summer Conference, which opens with a talk by the president of Educause and closes with a talk by MIT's Henry Jenkins, an expert on media and popular culture.

National Alliance for Public Charter Schools [2]
22-25, New Orleans, Louisiana

"Still We Rise: Achieving Academic Excellence at Scale" is the theme of the only national gathering of the entire charter school community, meeting in the city with the largest percentage of public charter school enrollment. Geoffrey Canada, of Harlem Children's Zone, is keynote. Absorb everything you need to know about charter schools while enjoying the music and food of the region.

Model Schools Conference [3]
22-25, Orlando, Florida

The worthy goal: A rigorous and relevant education for all students. The conference showcases successful K-12 programs, instructional practices, and research, as well as keynotes by luminaries in the field.

NECC [4]
28-July 2, San Antonio, Texas

Don't forget the Alamo, but don't forget this annual ed-tech blowout, either. This year, the National Educational Computing Conference is in San Antonio, which promises to be hot as a pizza oven. There'll be hundreds of booths, dozens of panels, and thousands of attendees. Pack sensible shoes.

July

The Stonington Retreat [5]
8-11, New York City, New York

Like a technology boot camp, this intensive workshop aims to help you integrate creative technology into your class, museum, or community organization. Get busy in hands-on workshops on robotics, animation, digital video, and blogging. And don't miss a special guest instructor, the MIT Media Lab's Mitchel Resnick.

High Schools That Work [6]
9-12, Nashville, Tennessee

Visit Music City and join educators from across the nation for hundreds of school-improvement workshops.

Games + Learning + Society Conference [7]
10-11, Madison, Wisconsin

How does playing games enhance learning? What impact do games have on society? Academics, designers, and educators gather in the dairy heartland for interactive discussions, discussion groups, and, of course, some game playing!

Scratch@MIT [8]
24-26, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Visit the home of MIT at the inaugural Scratch conference, where you can share your experience and "imagine the possibilities" of this programming language, which is designed to help kids ages eight and older develop twenty-first-century learning skills.

AUGUST

GIS [9]
4-8, San Diego, California

Meet with members of the worldwide geographic-information-system (GIS) education community during this one-of-a-kind forum. Explore how to use GIS software in your field, maximizing teaching, understanding, and managing.