NE TURN met on March 23-24 at the Microsoft Technology Center in Burlington, MA. Many thanks to Paul and Dennis Toner for their help in securing this wonderful facility for our NE TURN conferences!
The opening session on “Excellence Through Equity†by Dr. Ron Ferguson, Director of the Academic Achievement Gap Initiative at Harvard University, provided the context for our participating teams as they considered how to define and address the issue of “equity.â€
Tripod Education Partners (tripoded.com) shared research findings from their Beginning Teacher Survey which engaged 5 NE TURN districts in their pilot survey this year. The survey collects feedback on topics including: assessing students, classroom management, lesson planning, managing stress.
BARR, Building Assets-Reducing Risks, shared their approach to leverage strength to serve all students with an intensive focus on 9th graders entering high school. Snowden International School at Copley, a Boston Public School, shared their experiences using the BARR approach.
A newly formed NE TURN Steering Committee met prior to start of our spring conference to finalize the agenda design and begin future planning. This group will help shape the NE TURN focus and help develop the fall agenda design, which will continue to support teams efforts to address issues of equity and implement SEL through school and district level union-management partnerships.