1,200 Educators Attend America's Choice National Conference

Wide-ranging discussions of school-improvement strategies highlighted the 2004 AmericaIs Choice National Conference at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel in Los Angeles, California, January 22-24. More than 1,200 educators from America's Choice schools and school districts nationwide attended the annual event.

Keynote speakers from different parts of the education community talked about school reform past, present, and future. New York City schools chancellor Joel Klein discussed the importance of transforming the public school "culture," while Wendy Puriefoy, president of the Public Education Network, emphasized the importance of teachers in standards-based reform. Manual Rivera, superintendent of schools in Rochester, New York, discussed the value of partnerships between school systems and catalysts for school improvement such as the America's Choice School Design. Gloria Watson, an America's Choice principal, recounted how the America's Choice design has helped her turnaround the Dionne Warwick Institute of Economics and Entrepreneurship, an elementary school in troubled East Orange, New Jersey.

Conference participants attended a wide range of sessions on America's Choice strategies for raising student achievement. Topics included English language learners, literacy, mathematics, school leadership, parental involvement, the concept of school "coaches," and research on the performance of schools that have introduced the America's Choice School Design. There were also sessions on school accountability, strategic thinking for school leaders, analyzing student work, and elements of the America's Choice curriculum, including "core assignments" in math and "genre studies" for secondary students.

"The sessions," observed a Hawaiian educator, "were packed full of statistics, useful information and strategies for the classroom. I learned a tremendous amount that I can pass on to my colleagues and teach to my students," he said.

Many pre-conference participants toured Roosevelt Elementary School, an America's Choice school in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Information about next year's national conference will be posted on our website in the near future.