Industry News
ISTE Announces Election Results
ISTE has announced the election results for its 2006-2007 board. Returning to the board are Doug Johnson, the director of Media and Technology for Mankato Area Public Schools in Minnesota, who will be the board’s at-large representative, and Kyle Peck, an education professor and the associate dean for Outreach, Technology, and International Programs at Penn State University in Philadelphia, who is stepping in as teachereducation representative.
ISTE will be welcoming five new board members: Jill Brown, director of Educational Technology for Albuquerque Academy (NM), an independent school for students in grades 6-12; Camilla Gagliolo, instructional technology coordinator for Arlington Public Schools in Virginia; Ryan Imbriale, an eLearning specialist with the Baltimore City Public School District; Richard Martinez, the chief technology officer for the Southwest Independent School District in Texas; and Helen Soulé, the executive director for Cable in the Classroom, the cable industry’s education foundation inWashington, DC.
Kurt Steinhaus, the deputy cabinet secretary for the New Mexico Department of Education, will continue as board president.
Illinois School District Wins Charp Award
IMAGINE A SCHOOL DISTRICT where on every teacher’s desk sits an Internet-ready computer, and where most classrooms are equipped with LCD projectors. Niles Township High Schools District 219 (IL) realized that dream, and in recognition has been honored with the 2006 Sylvia Charp Award for District Innovationin Technology.
The Charp Award was drawn up by T.H.E. Journal and ISTE and is named for the first editor-in-chief of T.H.E. Journal. The award honors school districts that exhibit effectiveness and innovation in applying technology districtwide. To be considered for the award, districts must show a consistent, successful effort in the implementation of technology and a commitment to sharing their technology information with other districts. In addition, the district must use ISTE’s National Education Technology Standards or a derivative of those standards.
Many aspects of Niles Township HSD’s technology infrastructure satisfy both the letter and the spirit of the award. Niles Township is a model of a striving, technologically advanced district. Its Professional Development Center is equipped with workstations overseen by fulltime technology training managers, in addition to two media labs available to students and teachers. Each lab is equipped with 16 eMac workstations and is able to accommodate whole classes.
Rounding out its efforts, the district has formed a committee to monitor its technology planning and implementation.
Educators Meet to Talk Design
WHAT WILL SCHOOLS OF THE FUTURE LOOK LIKE? Thousands of educators plan to find out at this month’s American Institute of Architects 2006 National Convention and Design Exposition. The conference, to be held June 8-10 at the Los Angeles Convention Center, will feature a number of sessions about architectureand school design, including:
- innovative schools
- innovative learning environments
- universities as community builders
- designing new schools as centers of communities in urban areas
- designing a dense, three-school K-12 campus
In conjunction with the conference, AIA is offering a number of field trips into the Los Angeles educational community for conference participants to learn more about architecture and design behind new high-performance schools and high schools of the future.
One trip will take attendees to two L.A. high schools that have demonstrated creative solutions for schools built on undersized and challenging urban sites. On another tour, educators will visit two educational facilities in similar manufacturing zones and learn how the schools have adapted to these surroundings. To register for the conference or for more information, click here.
This article originally appeared in the 06/01/2006 issue of THE Journal.