Friday, January 07, 2011

Live Interview on Tuesday Jan. 11 - Ira David Socol

Join me Tuesday, January 11th, for a live and interactive FutureofEducation.com webinar with Ira David Socol on education, reform, technology, and more.

Date: Tuesday, January 11th, 2011
Time: 5pm Pacific / 8pm Eastern / 1am GMT (next day--international times here)
Duration: 1 hour
Location: In Elluminate. Log in at http://tr.im/futureofed. The Elluminate room will be open up to 30 minutes before the event if you want to come in early. To make sure that your computer is configured for Elluminate, please visit http://www.elluminate.com/support. Recordings of the session will be posted within a day of the event at the event page.
Event and Recording Pagehttp://www.learncentral.org/event/127864

Ira David Socol is a Research and Teaching Assistant at Michigan State University.  Thomas Hanson at OpenEducation.net, in the introduction to an interview with Ira, described him and his work as follows:

"First, there is little doubt that Ira is passionate about education and the process of learning. More importantly, that passion is relentlessly focused on creating a learning process that is responsive to the needs of learners.

"Second, to be frank, Ira shares some of our views on how best to reform education. He notes that there are a multitude of ways to create positive learning opportunities for students but our current school structures prevent the flexibility necessary to provide alternate paths. Like OpenEducation.net, he is also a strong proponent of the use of technology yet does not buy into the “digital natives” nonsense.

"Third and perhaps most importantly, Ira is extremely courageous. He is unwavering in his support for students and is willing to step out on a limb if it means questioning the system. He is one of the rare individuals we have seen who has been willing to speak out about what he sees as fundamental flaws in programs like Teach for America and the KIPP school concept (Knowledge is Power Program).

"Ultimately, we believe it is important that everyone involved in education is familiar with his work."

Ira is the author of The Drool Room and the web site SpeEdChange.

The Drool Room