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Wednesday, September 26, 2012

A Glimpse of EdTour 2012 « InterACT

A Glimpse of EdTour 2012 « InterACT:


A Glimpse of EdTour 2012

The U.S. Education Department has wrapped up its 2012 tour, conducted under the banner “Education Drives America.”  You can read about some of the events and interactions at the official blog of the bus tour: Teaching Ambassador Fellow Dan Brown wrote up a good summary.  While I think its appropriate to maintain a degree of skepticism about public relations events like this, I credit the department for creating actual opportunities for relations.  The events I saw in the San Francisco Bay Area on September 12th were more than photo-ops.
The tour began at Sequoia High School in Redwood City, California, with speakers and a panel discussion moderated by Arne Duncan.   The panel participants were Andrew Ng (a computer science professor at Stanford), Sal Khan (who probably no longer needs any introduction), and Catlin Tucker, a high school English teacher, author, blogger, and member of Accomplished California Teachers.  (Click to read Catlin’s blog postabout the event).
panel
Back-to-School Bus Tour panel discussion (l-r): Arne Duncan, Andrew Ng, Sal Khan, Catlin Tucker (photo by the author)
The conversation seemed fruitful and informative