Oct 27 2009
WISE Summit Doha, Qatar
I have recently confirmed that in mid November I will be travelling to Doha, Qatar to be part of the World Innovations Summit for Education, hosted by Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.
According to the conference information the,
WISE Forum is a “by invitation only” event that will bring together 1,000 leading education figures from all disciplines, levels, supports and media coming from more than 50 countries and representing the 5 continents.
Earlier this year I was invited to an event in London by the organisers but was unable to attend. So I was thrilled to receive one of only a thousand invites for the summit. I would like to think that I will attend the conference as one of the representatives for UK education and will have the opportunity to meet with some equally passionate people from around the world.
As I understand it the invite was as a result of someone reading my blog and I suppose it is a small reward for me and this space and the time and effort I have put in over the last 3 years.
I was sceptical whether I would be able to have the time away from school, but understood that you don’t get many opportunities like this either. With the support of my family and headteacher I have decided to go.
I have signed up for a range of interesting workshops and breakout sessions across the three days.
- Day 1 – Education and Community Development / Technology and E-learning.
- Day 2 – Globalisation of Education: Preparing Students for a Global Economy and Society / Increasing Access Through Technology.
- Day 3 – Tomorrow’s Education / Innovation and New Pedagogical Trends.
I think that I will enjoy many of these and feel that with my experiences I would also be able to contribute substantially to the discussions that take place.
It has been mentioned that Biz Stone, the co-founder of Twitter, is attending. If I get the chance to talk with him I will be sure to explain how transformational Twitter has become for teacher’s professional development across the world. Saying that, let’s hope the whole conference gets that already. If they don’t you can guess who will be banging that particular drum.
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Brilliant! We couldn’t hope for a better, harder-working, or more passionate and committed ambassador. I look forward to your pre-, in- and post-conference blog posts!
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Well done, Tom. Richly deserved. We also know you will share all you learn on this journey. Congratulations!
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Congratulations, Tom! I can’t think of a better UK ambassador.
Looking forward to you sharing what you learn.
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Congratulations Tom. You’re the right person for such an important summit. Your forward thinking views on teaching and learning will have the ears of a thousand worldly participants while your posts will have the eyes of many thousands more.
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Obviously, I echo the comments above, but one more thought,…
Clearly, this is an exciting opportunity for those of us in your PLN, but the challenge of this international event is to extend the developments and discussions that make us so excited, to those teachers outside the warmth of the white heat of great practitioners like you. How do we increase the scope and extent of this technology – rather than just talk about how great the few are (flipping fantastic as you are!)?
My challenge to you, it to ask the policy people there what they are doing to take the innovation to the majority of the profession, internationally!
couldn’t let you go without a challenge – right?
speak soon!
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Fantastic Tom!
You’re absolutely the right person to attend – warmly and gently welcoming new-comers to share your experiences, and at the other end, thinking far enough outside the box to make the big steps.
Looking forward to following your tweets/blogposts along the way.
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