TURN: Teacher Union Reform Network
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Southwest TURN Fall 2013 Conference: PAR and the Common Core

November 3, 2013

Atlanta, GA (Nov 2-3, 2013) ~ The fall 2013 meeting of Southwest TURN was held in Atlanta, GA on November 2-3, following the National TURN meeting. The meeting included presentations on Peer Assistance and Review and the Common Core, as well as the usual SW TURN business meeting and framing and messaging training.

There was a total of forty participants (16 first-timers) from seven states: Arizona, Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico, Nevada, Texas and Utah participated.

Tracey Johnson, Staff Consultant, Columbus (OH) Education Association, spoke on the subject of Peer Assistance and Review (PAR).

Dr. Primrose Cameron-Hall, Professional Development & Membership Specialist with the Volusia (FL) Teachers Organization, addressed the theme: "Collaboration for Meeting the Challenges of Common Core and Other Standards"

Day 2 focused on the "Better Way" plan (also known as "Results for Students"), an update on Extended Learning Opportunities work, and messaging for Assocaition effectiveness.

Results For Students

The fall 2013 meeting of Southwest TURN was held in Atlanta, GA on November 2-3, following the National TURN meeting. The focus of the meeting was Results For Students, with presentations on Peer Assistance and Review, implementing the Common Core, and framing and message training. The meeting was attended by leaders in education from Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Texas.

Agenda

Nov. 2nd

The first session of the conference was on Teacher Evaluation and Peer Assistance and Review, presented by Tracey Johnson (click names for e-mail) from the Columbus (OH) Education Association. Tracey’s presentation focused on the collaboration between the Columbus City Schools and the Columbus Education Association. Giving a guide to how unions and districts can work collectively. Tracey showed how Columbus City Schools is using Peer Review to help beginning teachers master their profession. This presentation is great at giving the ground work on how to set-up a Peer Review system that has had success. The presentation was helpful by giving detailed criteria on how Columbus City Schools selects their consulting teachers for PAR.

The second session of the day featured a presentation by Dr. Primrose Cameron-Hall and Kymberly Taylor, from the Volusia (FL) Teachers Organization, on the Collaboration for Meeting the Challenges of Common core and Other Standards. A special thanks to the two of them for the extra long journey to make it to our meeting. This presentation gave a guide to how the Volusia Teachers Organization was able to collaboratively work with their district and state to implement common core in a way that will help the teacher in the classroom be successful. The presentation also gives examples of how common core can be used in the mathematics class room, with a presentation on” Introduction to the Common Core Mathematics Shifts” This part of the presentation has links to videos that could be useful in helping math teachers in your district handle a transition to Common Core.

Sunday, November 3rd started out with a review and update of the work done by SW TURN and a discussion on what TURN should focus on in the future. Click here for the ELO report from DU that was mentioned in the meeting.

To end the conference Ami Prichard from Jefferson County (CO) Education Association gave a presentation on Messaging for Association Effectiveness. Framing is becoming more and more important in our fight to achieve results for students. For more information on framing check out the webinar on framing from 2011. After Ami’s discussion on framing the SW TURN attendees broke into small groups to debate what things might need to be updated or changed to the 3 legged framing that was created at the Las Vegas Conference.

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If you have any questions about this meeting, please contact Simon Workman, sjw@apaconsulting.net.