February 17, 2009

Over the mountain and through the woods, off to the IU10 I go; yep, quite stupid, but you have to know where our IU is, and you might understand. I took teacher K with me, and she did a great job showing some of the things she did. I loved the questions she generated from the group of CFF coaches. There was another teacher there from another school (she also was a PV grad like K), and she did a great job on some of the things she was doing in biology. We had an oovoo discussion with Beth, who is from PDE, and talked about other ideas dealing with CFF. I am going to digress here and write bout two concepts from my soapbox. First, I am going to talk about K. I had no hand in her hiring, but I must admit that I am so proud to have her in my former position. She has great vision and is not afraid of dealing outside the box. I like her pizazz, and her ability to ascertain situations. What a great addition to PV and the teaching profession. She will create a great footprint on her students. Secondly, I am going to promote an IU10 regional conference for CFF. Do not get me wrong. I attended PETE&C and loved it, but I feel a regional conference hosted by one of the school districts would allow more people to attend and would allow more interaction among the participants and presenters. The important part to all of this I feel would be more collaboration among the schools and the teachers. We need to break down the barriers that exist and promote more with the internet 2.0 concept....For all of my Italian contacts.....Addio.....flick

April 3, 2008

Meetings is a word that does spell out the character of my day. The first meeting involved writing the CFF grant for next year. I have worked on some grants, but the involvement of this one is quite extensive. We are considering getting Macs for this phase of the grant. It would include some changes to the network, but I have always liked the dual-platformed concept; I even feel the tri-platform as even better. In the afternoon, I attended a CFF meeting at IU10 in Philipsburg. The meeting gave CFF coaches a chance to network and look at work from the various schools. We also had a the opportunity to talk with our regional representative from PDE. We expressed some of our concerns with her, but we also told her of our triumphs. It is sometimes difficult dealing with bureaucracy, and when one deals with a person face-to-face, it is somewhat comforting, although there is always that cynicism developed innately through years of dealing with the government. Being out all day means that I will have to do a lot of catch up tomorrow. It is the law of the West. The weekend is around the corner.