A Welcome and Invitation from the Planning Committee

North Dakota Study Group
Annual Meeting
February 11 - 14, 2010

Educating for Social Justice

University of St. Mary's by the Lake
Mundelain, IL

On behalf of the 2010 Planning Committee, we invite you to attend the 38th meeting of the North Dakota Study Group. The year's meeting will take place on President's Day weekend, February 12-14, 2010. As we did last year, we will meet at the University of St. Mary by the Lake, Mundelein, IL – still northwest of Chicago.

Discussion at this summer's planning committee meeting focused on several issues:

• The important role democracy plays in teaching and education, particularly considering the political context in which both the Bush and the Obama administration have placed public education;
• The role race and class play not only in educational policy, but in student experience;
• The effect charter schools have had on local public schools;
• The importance of play in any curriculum;
• The influence high stakes testing has had on pedagogy and the necessary continuation to fight against high-stakes standardized testing while promoting high-quality classroom- and school-based assessments as a vital educational tool.
• The importance of continuing and deepening NDSG's work with young people, listening carefully to their voices; and,
• Ensuring we continue to feature the voices of teachers, long-standing and new.

After a day of conversation and processing ideas, the theme of educating for social justice emerged. Over the course of our meeting we will meet in plenaries, home groups and affinity groups to deepen our thoughts in regard to this theme. We will hear from presenters, listen to panels and learn about our colleagues' works-in-progress. In preparation for our discussions, the Planning Committee highly recommends conference participants read Why School? by Mike Rose.

The NDSG has always valued what we have learned from our elders and what we can learn from youth. At this year's gathering, we will hear from some new voices, some younger voices and voices familiar from past meetings. Those voices include:

Grace Lee Boggs plus some youth from Detroit, Barbara Cervone and students from What Kids Can Do (WKCD), Jay Featherstone (at our opening), Curtis Lewis and youth with whom he works, Deborah Meier (at our closing), David Stovall, Doris Williams, Greta McHaney-Trice, Monty Neill, and more. We also hope Mike Rose will join us for a Works-in-Progress session via Skype.

As well, the North Dakota Study Group is mourning the recent loss of two colleagues, Ted Sizer and Jerry Bracey. In anticipation of remembering their contributions during this conference we encourage participants to select a passage or quote from the writings of Ted or Jerry to share with others.

We look forward to the collective sharing of experience and wisdom, a hearty mix of the political and the poetical, the great fellowship that accompanies the give and take in a diverse group of professionals who enjoy a lively sharing of theory and practice. We appreciate the unrushed time frame that allows for the development of our thinking and a lasting commitment to creative consideration of the possibilities for change.

We maintain a financial aid fund to help maintain the diversity of our membership. Please contribute to this fund.

We look forward to see you all at our always-invigorating meeting. Please join us!
Sincerely,

The 2010 North Dakota Study Group Planning Committee:

Co-Chairs: Francisco Guajardo, Greta McHaney-Trice, and Sid Massey

Members at Buxton meeting: Marsha Dempsey, Helen Featherstone, Jay Featherstone, Molly Foresta, Mary Harris, John Lockhart, Ariel Nadelstern, Monty Neill, Debra Stoleroff, Lynne Strieb, Elsa Weber

Other members: Bill Bennett, Joan Bradbury, Phyllis Bretholtz, Rebecca DeCola, Broderick Webb, Ann Wiener, and our 'nitty gritty' team of Dan Schwartz, Carol Kennett, and Carol Montag.

Thanks once again to the Buxton School for hosting our summer planning meeting.

 

More Detailed Information about NDSG 2010 Meeting:

Readings

This year, our primary reading will be Why School? by Mike Rose. In the tradition of Jonathan Kozol, this little book is driven by big questions. What does it mean to be educated? What is intelligence? How should we think about intelligence, education, and opportunity in an open society? Why is a commitment to the public sphere central to the way we answer these questions?

Drawing on forty years of teaching and research, from primary school to adult education and workplace training, award-winning author Mike Rose reflects on these and other questions related to public schooling in America. He answers them in beautifully written chapters that are both rich in detail—a first-grader conducting a science experiment, a carpenter solving a problem on the fly, a college student's encounter with a story by James Joyce—and informed by a deep and powerful understanding of history, the psychology of learning, and the politics of education.

Rose decries the narrow focus of educational policy in our time: the drumbeat of test scores and economic competition. Why School? will be embraced by parents and teachers alike, and readers everywhere will be captivated by Rose's eloquent call for a bountiful democratic vision of the purpose of schooling. (From the New Press website)

Please obtain and read this short book before the conference.

Home Groups

Each participant is assigned a home group. The home groups will meet two times this year to discuss Why School? by Mike Rose. We encourage you to read ahead in order to benefit as much as possible from the presentations and discussions.

Affinity Groups

Affinity groups at NDSG started about 7 years ago as a way for people of similar racial heritage to discuss issues and concerns regarding education. Affinity groups have at times been controversial and sometimes hard, but ultimately, NDSG participants continue to appreciate and ask for them in feedback surveys. This year we have one planned Affinity Group meeting.

Works in Progress (WIP)

If you would like to share your ongoing work with your colleagues in a small WIP session, send a description to Helen Featherstone, feather1@msu.edu and Jay Featherstone, josfe@msu.edu. Please include your proposed format, suggested duration (between one and 1.5 hours), and any equipment or set-up you need.

About the Presenters

Grace Lee Boggs is an activist intellectual whose more than sixty years of political involvement encompass the major social movements of the last century: Labor, Civil Rights, Black Power, Asian American, Women's and Environmental Justice. Born in 1915, Grace worked in the 1930's with West Indian Marxist revolutionary C.L.R. James in the Johnson-Forrest Tendency. In 1953 she moved to Detroit where she married James Boggs, an African-American autoworker, labor activist, and writer. They were partners for over 40 years until Boggs' death in 1993. Their book, Revolution and Evolution in the Twentieth Century, was first published in 1974 and re-published with a new forward by Grace last year. Her autobiography, Living for Change, published in 1998, is essential reading. She currently leads the Boggs Center in Detroit, a convergence of activity focused on re-imagining, re-culturing, re-visioning, and re-building our lives and our environments from the bottom up---from chaos to community. The Boggs Center describes Detroit as a City of Hope, the place where new ideas of (r)evolution in the 21st Century are being hammered out now. It is in the forefront of urban agriculture and grassroots community (re)development work, alternative economic and social relationship building, art and mural making, and poetry from the people.

Barbara Cervone, Ed.D. is an educator and journalist with more than 50 years' experience supporting adolescent learning in and out of school. She is founder and president of What Kids Can Do, Inc. Previously, she coordinated Walter H. Annenberg’s $500 million "Challenge" to reform the nation’s schools. As national coordinator she directed research and communications among the Challenge's 18 projects. Dr. Cervone has also served as associate director of the Rhode Island Foundation; been a consultant in program evaluation and an investigator for several national education research projects; worked in the alternative school movement, first as a researcher and later as the coordinator of a network of 30 alternative high schools in 10 states. She has written extensively about school reform alone and as co-author with youth.

Curtis Lewis taught elementary school and alternative education for the Lansing Public Schools for several years where he also served as lead teacher for their Credit Recovery Program for expelled students. For the past two years has directed the Promoting Academic Success mentoring program (PAS) for minority males- a collaborative research project between the Lansing Schools and Michigan State University. He is also the Program Manager for the Ingham County Restorative Justice Diversion Program designed to provide first time youth offenders an alternative to from the court system. His work and academic interests address his passion concerning issues of equity and social justice for all students in K-12 schools. He is a fourth year doctoral student at Michigan State.

Greta McHaney-Trice teaches elementary school in Lansing, Michigan where she, like many today, tires to balance the tensions between policy of No Child Let Behind and true "best practice". She collaborates with teacher educators at Michigan State University and other professional alliances toward improving progressive and democratic learning opportunities for all children.

Monty Neill, Ed.D. is Interim Executive Deputy Director of FairTest, the nation's only group focusing exclusively on reforming test use in education. He also chairs the Forum on Educational Accountability, an alliance of education, civil rights, religious, disability, and other civic groups working to overhaul NCLB.

Dr. David Stovall studies the influence of race in urban education, community development, and housing. His work investigates the significance of race in the quality of schools located in communities that are changing both racially and economically. From a practical and theoretical perspective, his research draws from Critical Race Theory, educational policy analysis, sociology, urban planning, political science, community organizing, and youth culture.

Dr. Doris Williams is Director of Capacity Building for the Rural School and Community Trust (formerly the Annenberg Rural Challenge), RSCT is the premier national non-profit organization addressing the crucial relationship between good rural schools and thriving rural communities. Williams guides and oversees the organization's work with a network that has numbered more than 700 rural schools and communities in 35 states. She has overseen the development and field-testing of an assessment system for place-based, project-based and service learning in partnership with the Educational Testing Service. She has also designed a rural school leadership development initiative for the Deep South. In addition, she leads the Rural Trust's efforts at rural high school reform, its Rural Teacher Development Center, and its Education Renewal Zones initiative.

About the Panels

Barbara Cervone and What Kids Can Do (WKCD): What Kids Can Do (WKCD), based in Providence, R.I., is a national nonprofit founded in 2001 which supports adolescent learning in and out of school and around the world. Using the Internet, print, and broadcast media, WKCD presses a dual message before the broadest audience possible -- the power of what young people can accomplish when given the opportunities and supports they need, and what they can contribute when we take their voices and ideas seriously. WKCD views young people as active collaborators in every phase of its work. The youth who concern WKCD most are those marginalized by poverty, race, and language, aged 12 – 22. For more information go to: www.whatkidscando.org

Confronting The Tests: A panel with Doris Williams, Greta McHaney-Trice and Monty Neill will discuss the consequences of high-stakes testing mandated by federal and state governments, and suggest alternative approaches to assessment and things you can do.

The Importance of Play for Children: The current focus on preparing students for tests does not allow time for play or playfulness in many schools. This is particularly worrisome in pre-school, kindergarten, and elementary schools. There will be a brief presentation, an experiential play workshop, followed by a discussion of implications for action.

Logistics

Location - St. Mary's

The University of St. Mary of the Lake is located at 1000 E. Maple Avenue in the town of Mundelein, IL approximately four miles west of Interstate 94. The closest airport is O'Hare International Airport, which is about 28 miles south of USML. Directions to St. Mary’s are provided on the USML Conference Center website.

St. Mary’s has a beautiful, large, lakeside campus. Accommodations include single or double rooms. Each room has its own bathroom. All meals are included and include a vegetarian option.

Please note that most of us arrive Thursday evening so we can start quickly on Friday morning. We end Sunday morning (approximately 11:00 A.M. CST) in time for people to make early afternoon flights.

Online Registration

Thanks to the work of Lyn DeLorme, this year, NDSG is able to securely register everyone online. You will be able to register for the full conference or, if you are local to Chicago surrounds, for one day of the conference. We urge you to use your credit card, which is enormously helpful to us. Please note the deadline for early bird registration is December 15.

Yes! Take me to online registration!

Financial Aid

NDSG maintains a scholarship fund to help ensure diversity at the annual meeting. If you would like to request financial aid, please address a request, before December 15, to Mary Harris (mary.harris@unt.edu). Preference will be given to requests received before that date.

To apply for financial aid:

The NDSG Financial Aid Fund was created to increase the diversity of the NDSG Conference. Diversity is conceived broadly and can include ethnic and cultural background, age, region, social class, etc. In your application for financial aid, please let us know how you would contribute to the diversity of the Conference. Please include your background, what you are doing now, and why you would like to attend the NDSG Conference. Please be specific about the amount you need.

Submit requests for aid, before December 15, 2009, to Mary Harris (mary.harris@unt.edu). Preference will be given to requests received before that date.

If you would like to contribute to the financial aid fund, please include it with your registration or make a separate check payable to the Financial Aid Fund, NDSG and send it to NDSG, Buxton School, 291 South Street, Williamstown, MA 01267. We do need contributions – and no contribution is too small.

Costs:

This year the registration fee is $440 for a double occupancy room, $540 for a single for registrations received on or before December 15, 2009. Fees increase $25 after December 15, 2009. There is a rolling registration with a deadline of January 15, 2010 unless all seats fill before that date. The meeting fills very quickly and registration is on a first come, first served basis.

Partial Conference Attendance: Daily Conference Fee - $115 and includes meals for that day, No overnight accommodations, please.

You can register online. If you choose not to register online, please contact Judy Lescarbeau at 413-458-3919 ext., 101 or email: office@BuxtonSchool.org. A check for full payment should be made payable to North Dakota Study Group and mailed to Bill Bennett, Buxton School, 291 South Street, Williamstown, MA 01267.

Bus & Transportation Information:

Flights should be booked to O'Hare. We advise you to arrive on Thursday evening to be ready for the early morning session on Friday.

Please remember as you make your reservations that there will be one bus from O'Hare Airport at 7:30 PM Thursday night and one bus back to O'Hare on Sunday leaving at 11:00 AM, arriving there in time for l:00 pm or later flights. The bus will be outside of the baggage claim area of American Airlines at Door 3A, lower level on Thursday night. There will be no bus service on Friday or Saturday. The cost for the bus is $25.00 each way.

If you miss the bus, you can call H & M Limo Service at 888-428-4785, McHenry Limo Service at 1-800-344-4466 or GNT Limo Service at 815-455-4060. The cost of a limo for one person is approximately $50.00.

There is a light supper available when you arrive Thursday evening. Please pre-register. Cost is $10.00.

Contact Information

For general registration information, please contact:
Judy Lescarbeau at 413-458-3919 ext., 101 or email: office@BuxtonSchool.org.

For specific rooming information please contact:
Dan Schwartz by email: schwartd@winnetka36.org.

Cancellation Policy:

Any persons canceling their participation in NDSG Annual Meeting before February 1, 2010, will be charged a $25 administration fee with the balance returned to the member. On or after February 1, 2010, no refund is guaranteed. We will endeavor to make partial refunds on an individual basis, depending on St. Mary's final invoice.