The renowned conductor and founder of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, Benjamin Zander, was the keynote speaker for the 2002 ACTE Annual Convention. A masterful musician and dynamic speaker, Zander inspired the crowd with his energetic delivery of an important message.
Referring to the convention theme?The Magic of Change?Zander explained his view that ?change causes magic?it is not the result of magic.? And, said Zander, ?leadership causes change.?
In discussing leadership, Zander joked that, ?The conductor is the last bastion of totalitarianism in the civilized world.? But he spoke of a new kind of leader emerging today, ?one who is masterful in the distinctions.? This means being able to understand and categorize whatever he or she encounters.
?You cannot learn anything unless you have something at stake,? he noted. ?You cannot see anything if you do not have a category for it.? He added that, ?Education may not be so much the transference of information but the opening up of new categories.?
Zander suggested that the audience of teachers see themselves as conductors in the classroom. Although teachers do not have the kind of ultimate control over students that a conductor has over musicians, he used the metaphor to explain the jobs of conductors and teachers as awakening possibility in others.
All of those in attendance at that opening session had the experience of being conducted in song by the famous conductor and founder of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra. We sang Beethoven?s Ninth Symphony, Ode to Joy...in German. Who knew we could even do that (other than Benjamin Zander)? It?s amazing what can happen when you open yourself up to the art of possibility.
On Friday morning, Glen Hiemstra, a nationally respected futurist and founder and CEO of Futurist.com, offered ACTE convention attendees a look at what the future may have in store for us.
?Our image of the future exerts influence on what we do today,? Hiemstra said. ?To change the future, we must change our image of the future today.?
He also tried to help the audience of educators envision what communication, teaching and learning could look like in the future, as he presented a simulation of augmented reality glasses that allow a viewer to look simultaneously at computerized data and the real world of the classroom.
?Everything possible today was at one time impossible,? says Hiemstra. ?Everything impossible today may at some time in the future be possible.?
The three questions he would like us to ask are: What is probable in the future? What is possible? What is preferred?
?As you work with your students,? Hiemstra advised, ?you should try to help them answer the question, ?What is my preferred future???
Eileen McDargh is a former teacher who still knows how to do her homework. She had listened to the previous speakers and she had heard the concerns about Perkins funding voiced at the convention, so she tied some of her message into meeting the challenges facing career and technical education.
McDargh once taught in a rural community on the Florida/Georgia border and said there were three teachers there whom she really appreciated: the agriculture education teacher, the business education teacher and the shop teacher. ?They meant everything to those kids,? she said.
McDargh, whose main topic and the subject of her book was Work for a Living & Still be Free to Live, offered advice to the assembled career tech educators about achieving balance and focus for living more happily.
Sunday?s speaker, Mark Therrien, offered additional advice on achieving happiness. His special area of expertise is in helping organizations and people create joyful workplaces, and his presentation was on The Power of Yes! Embracing Change.
Although the convention was filled with positive messages about joy and possibility, one issue kept returning to the forefront, and that was the reauthorization of Perkins.
A 1:15 p.m. session on Thursday, titled ?Perkins III Performance Measure?Where We?ve Been, Where We Are, and Where We Are Going,? was standing room only. Maurice James with the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Vocational and Adult Education was the presenter, and he outlined Perkins III accountability progress and discussed an initiative that will develop a new generation of secondary and postsecondary performance indicators. James talked about the monitoring process and noted that they would be trying to monitor 20-24 states this year. The concept of monitoring has changed to more of a focus on what can be done for improvement. ?Monitoring is technical assistance,? he explained.
But with the rumors that had originated from the White House in the weeks before the convention suggesting that funding for Perkins might be eliminated in order to fund a $2 to $3 billion shortfall in Pell grants, attendees at the packed session wanted to know one thing: Would there still be Perkins money for career and technical education?
?It is not the department?s proposal, from what I understand, that this money will be taken and used for Pell grants and the department will be done away with,? said James. ?That is not the decision of the current assistant secretary, and that will not be in her proposal.?
The session with James was followed at 2:15 the same day by ?Congressional Views on the Perkins Reauthorization,? which attracted even more attendees. It immediately became apparent that the number of people waiting to get into the room far exceeded the room?s capacity. Fortunately, the efficient ACTE convention staff acted quickly to relocate a session from an adjacent room so that the partition between the two rooms could be removed to create a space large enough to hold the crowd waiting to hear the Perkins presentation.
ACTE Government Relations Director Nancy O?Brien immediately addressed the rumors about the budget with regard to ?zeroing out the Perkins Act.? She explained that while, ?no one from the administration is allowed to talk to us about the president?s budget proposal,? ACTE had gotten wind of the situation and taken immediate action.
?We don?t know if it?s a dead issue yet,? said O?Brien, ?but we know we have made an impact.?
She also noted that friends of career and technical education in both parties have said that eliminating Perkins funding is not the direction they want to take.
Krisanne Pearce, who works with the Republican side on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, said her members of the committee know what career and technical education means. ?It is my understanding that Perkins funding will not be eliminated,? said Pearce.
The next Congress will have a number of legislative issues to tackle, including seven that are carried over from the last Congress. One of those is the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which Pearce said Congress ?will have to deal with before getting into Perkins,? and that could take awhile.
Pearce said that she ?does not expect any major overhaul on Perkins,? but added that their staff is focusing on integrating career and technical education into academics to improve achievement.
Alex Nock, the other congressional staff member participating in the session, works for the Democrats on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, and he praised the efforts of O?Brien and legislative assistant Alisha Dixon. ?Nancy and Alisha work very hard for ACTE,? he said.
Nock worked on the last Perkins reauthorization and explained, ?A lot of changes were made in 1998 with regard to accountability,? which puts Perkins ?ahead of the game.?
Money for funding programs will definitely be an issue, especially with the current difficult economic situation, and Nock said that career and technical education is one of the programs that always seems to be going through a battle. But he cautioned against relaxing our efforts, because if the states see the federal government cutting funding to our programs, they will follow suit.
When asked about any changes in set aside funding for the tech prep program, Nock said he didn?t think such changes would happen. He thinks that with regard to tech prep, the question should be whether tech prep should be ?an even bigger deal.?
O?Brien pointed out that tech prep is 10 percent of Perkins funding?more than $100 million?and stressed that if it is not kept as a separate line item, that funding will be gone.
O?Brien, Pearce and Nock agree on one thing: We all need to work together on education funding issues.
?Stay involved,? advised Pearce, adding that the budget rumor provided very good practice for advocacy efforts. ?I can?t tell you how many faxes we received,? she said.
Even with the possibility of war, Nock believes that now is not the time to back off on education funding, especially not for career and technical education. ?It?s part of us being a strong nation,? he said.
When Assistant Secretary for Vocational and Adult Education Carol D?Amico addressed the opening session on Friday, she obviously knew what was on everyone?s mind. ?The rumors are rampant,? D?Amico admitted. And while she believes that many of the rumors are baseless, she acknowledged that they probably would continue until the president announces his budget proposal in February.
As to what will come of the current budget debate, D?Amico said, ?The outcome of these deliberations cannot be predicted at this time.?
ACTE?s government relations staff is not taking any chances on a favorable outcome for career and technical education and is, therefore, continuing its advocacy efforts?and urging all members of the career and technical education community to stay involved in the campaign.
