[neact] Re: NEACT Summer Conference - please respond
- From: Esther Hines <des_hines@xxxxxxx>
- To: <neact@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2011 00:34:14 +0000
Hi Jerusha
Happy new Year ! It is so nice to see someone like you with so much enthusiasm!
I am forwarding your e-mail to some friends of mine that work on some of the
professional fields you mentioned. Let's see what happens. Regarding the
teaching part I can find out more about SMART boards in the chemistry classroom
if you think is OK.
Esther
Esther Hines
Chemistry
Billerica Memorial High School
35 River Street
Billerica, MA 01821
ehines@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 15:01:32 -0500
From: jj@xxxxxxxx
Subject: [neact] NEACT Summer Conference - please respond
To: neact@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hi all, This summer’s NEACT conference will be held Aug 1-4 at St. Joseph’s in
Maine. It is 30 minutes outside of Portland; 2 hours north of Boston. In
recognition of the UN declaring 2011 the International Year of Chemistry, we
have decided to have the theme of this year’s summer conference be: Chemistry
in Today’s World. I have been thinking about the presentations for this topic
and have listed below several I would like to see. I welcome your suggestions
for speakers and other ideas for presentations. One type of presentation under
this topic would include teaching in today’s world. Presentations could
include what is the public’s view of chemistry and how can we, as chemistry
teachers influence that. Also, given the recession, I would love someone to
lead a workshop or presentation on ideas of how to teach effectively with
overly large class sizes. We should have a presentation on teaching critical
thinking and the scientific method vs. teaching content to meet the
requirements of the various standardized and AP tests. I would also like to
see a workshop on how to teach critical thinking. Texting is becoming the bane
of many teachers – does anyone want to lead a workshop on how we can use this
type of ubiquitous technology for our advantage? We keep hearing that we are
way behind other countries in Math and Science. What are the other countries
doing differently? Can we learn from them? Another type of presentation
could be around world issues: The third world has many issues that chemistry
can mitigate or solve. One of the biggest issues is safe drinking water. I
would like to see a presentation on the challenges and chemistry solutions that
are out there to bring clean water to people. I recall a Chematters article
from several years ago that talked about some communities that once they built
wells became terribly sick due to Arsenic leaching into them. I’m sure that
there are a plethora of great water related labs that someone could connect to
that presentation with a workshop. Food is another huge issue facing much of
the world. How is genetic modification, pesticides, organic farming and such
addressing these issues? Another good presentation would be from someone who
can explain the various roles that chemistry played in cleaning up the BP oil
spill. One of the roles that we as educators face is trying to connect
chemistry to the “real” world. As part of this, many schools have started
teaching a forensic science course at their schools. There were several
requests in the feedback forms after the last conference to have some forensic
workshops (with the focus on the chemistry more than the bio). I am currently
trying to see if we can have an additional component of the summer conference
include an in-depth safety training. These are ideas – I’m sure that you can
come up with even better ones under this theme. I need your help in coming up
with good presentations and workshops and help finding presenters. If you can
give me any suggestions on people to contact who might be able to talk on the
ideas suggested above, or ones that you come up with, PLEASE contact me. I
can’t do this without your help. Feel free to volunteer yourself! Our budget
is pretty low, as we try to keep the conference cost down so keep that in mind
when thinking of speakers. However we have found that sometimes even
professionals from industry are willing to speak for free or just a small
honorarium given who we are. Thanks so much for your continuing support for
NEACT and all your great ideas. Jerusha VogelNEACT President2011 Summer
Conference Program Chair
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