Views

The following are a few impressions of the highlights of the conference, some editted from the weekly NAACE newsletter.

Sessions by Alan November

We had many useful and interesting contributions but the top prize has to go the two presentations by Alan November. They were both valuable and memorable. It was a classic case of turning a problem into an opportunity. We had already switched the programme around to accommodate the Minister when, fairly late in the day, we learned that he was unable to come due to unexpected government business.We had already rearranged the Thursday programme to accommodate another speaker who was unavoidably indisposed.

Thus it was that Alan did two sessions. The first was delivered straight off the plane - he had flown in from the States. The Conference edition of the NAACE journal will carry the content. Suffice, to say here that the audience was fully engaged. It's a long time since my own thinking about education was so positively challenged. We were constantly brought back to "Why?" and to "For what purpose?" in a most entertaining and stimulating way.

We were helped to look beyond the immediate questions of how to use ICT in education to the deeper and longer-term issues of how we prepare young people to survive and thrive in a world economy that is being radically changed by ICT.

You can find out more on http://www.anovember.com

Common theme

Some of these deeper issues resonated through other sessions. The Opening Keynote by Chris Winter jerked them into the consciousness of the audience.

The following session was led by David Normington, Director of Schools at DfEE. This was much more on the here and now - but also raised important questions of "What next?" - answers to which we need to apply ourselves.

Peter Mortimore did a massive tour de force of school improvement on Friday.

The exhibition, on Friday afternoon, was bigger and better than ever. As usual it provided good opportunities for useful dialogue with many companies.

Saturday morning allowed an examination of some of the approaches being adopted by the television companies as the digital era is ushered in. The big issue of quality content was raised, particularly in regard to getting value out of greater interactivity. A lot more work to do here.