There are two ICT trade show events that I’d love to attend – NECC in the US and BETT in the UK. I’ve probably left it a bit late to attend BETT (it starts in a week or so), but I’m seriously considering attending the 2008 National Educational Computing Conference in San Antonio Texas. After hearing all about it for the last few years I’ve been curious and interested to attend a NECC event, and the 2008 event just happens to fall conveniently in the midyear Australian school holidays (where I potentially have a full three weeks off!)
One of the motivators for attending this year is thanks to the amazing connections I’ve made with so many educators throughout the US and Canada via tools like Twitter and Skype. I feel like 2007 has been the year of expanding my own personal learning network and I’m keen to get to an event like NECC to meet up with people in real life that I feel I’ve come to know through these virtual spaces. Besides, last years Bloggers Café sounded like a really fun thing to be part of and I like being part of fun things!
I noticed that there is a study tour being organised here in Australia that takes a detour via New Zealand and Silicon Valley to get to San Antonio and it’s looking like it might be a good use of some pre-tax dollars. I need to have a chat with my new school to see how this might fit in with their professional development plans, but regardless I think I’d like to head over to Texas and be part of it anyway.
The study tour details can be found at http://www.ictev.vic.edu.au/event/2008_ACCE_NECC2008_Study_Tour.htm, and here is a part of the blurb…
Spend time with colleagues in New Zealand, visit Apple in San Fanscisco, Dell in San Antonio, have small group time with key international educators, enjoy the celebration of ICT with 15,000 like-minded educators, receiving briefings from ISTEs key people, COSNs leaders, ISTEs international representative, meet and work with other international IT educators and enjoy two weeks immersed in technology in education.
So, fellow Aussies, whaddya reckon? Who else is thinking about going? And what about my American friends… twist our arms a little! It wouldn’t take much!
Tags: necc, sanantonio, ict, texas, studytour
See you in Texas? by Chris Betcher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Chris … sounds fun but $5grand pre-tax dollars is a lot by anyone’s reckoning ….. now wouldn’t it be nice if we could access gov. funding for this sort of thing…
ok Chris you’re on. Same as you, heard so much about, decided 2008 has to be the year to go, so I’m going, whether with the ICTEV tour or not. So see you there, I hope. And Happy New Year, enjoy the fireworks
In Twitter, I compared NECC to Woodstock.Some bloggers feel that the day of the mega conference may be drawing to a close, as people gravitate to smaller, less formal “bloggers cafe” type activities.
Don’t miss out on the chance to merge your virtual and real worlds.
“Then can I walk beside you
I have come here to lose the smog
And I feel to be a cog in something turning
Well maybe it is just the time of year
Or maybe its the time of man
I don’t know who l am
But you know life is for learning
We are stardust
We are golden
And we’ve got to get ourselves
Back to the garden…
By the time we got to woodstock
We were half a million strong
And everywhere there was song and celebration…”
-Joni Mitchell, “Woodstock”
I was wondering how to budget my trip to San Antonio this year. However, a trip from Los Angeles seems like a drop in the bucket compared to your expenses. NECC last year was amazing. This year promises to be even better. Hope to see you there.
I haven’t been to NECC since 2006 when it was in San Diego… hummm, if you come, I’ll have to see what arms I can twist at the district level to help sponsor a trip for me. (Nice to have a position where the boss will help pay.)
And Happy 2008; the year to celebrate!
I _guarantee_ you’ll have a great time at NECC, Chris! Stop by the ISTE Hub and say Hi! so I know you made it!
; )
Barbara Hewick
Web Marketing Manager
ISTE/NECC