Guerilla Educators

Target at CEFPI

At the risk of sounding like a corporate shill, I was impressed by the many ways that Target, Sponsor of the 88th Annual CEFPI World Conference in San Jose, made the experience there comfortable and first rate.  From the food to the gift of Keynote Speaker Thomas L. Friedman's book, The World is Flat, to all the behind the scenes support, Target was an invaluable, yet discrete resource.  Rich Varda, Target's lead architect and the face of that company at the CEFPI World Conference was an ideal spokesman.  While Target As Sponsor was of course sensitive to the positive public relations that accrues from such sponsorship, the focus of their support was to highlight CEFPI and my impression was that Mr. Varda's low key was responsible for that.  I don;t have a horse in this race and have never publicly offered such praise on behalf of a corporate sponsor, but looking back over the outstanding weekend in San Jose, it feels right to do so.       

CEFPI San Jose Postscript

Just back from the CEFPI conference in San Jose.  Well, it's official.  The Young Lions in CEFPI have now taken the reins from the Old Guard of Educational Facilities Planners.  San Jose was an exponential leap for CEFPI.  More educators, more International attendees, certainly more focus on technology, and a genuine desire to learn and listen to the needs of those on the front lines, in and out of classrooms.  This year, more than at any time in CEFPI's 85+ year history there is now more focus on actually learning about educational trends from educators and others from outside the school architect community.  In terms of technology applications, we saw what is truly exhilarating about living in this golden information age and the entrepreneurial leveraging of the web.  We also experienced at first hand some of the real challenges of living in a wired world.

2010 CEFPI World Conference in San Jose

To all CEFPI friends and colleagues; see you in San Jose!  The CEFPI World Conference will be held in San Jose, California from September 25-27.  There are great seminars and quite an impressive group of Keynote Speakers scheduled at this year's Event, headed up by the New York Times Foreign Affairs columnist, Mr. Thomas Friedman.  Instead of being a presenter, as has been the case in past years at Regional and National Conferences, it will be good to just attend, mingle, and network with old friends.

Guerilla Educators Charter School Services

Guerilla Educators is one of the nation's premier consulting advisers to prospective Charter School groups and to existing Charters, as well.  Our deep experience as Charter School Founder and consultant to numerous charters around the country positions us to help insure that your application will be accepted.  Upon acceptance, we will work with your staff to provide Professional Developments and ongoing support so your school provides quality teaching and learning opportunities from Day One.  Our Guerilla Educators Educational Facilities Design Service will also assist you with your physical facility needs.  We work with some of the finest school architects, planners, and designers to help you create spaces that will optimize your immediate facilities reality and, down the road, will work with you to create your ideal educational facility based on your specific needs.  Let's get started!

Educon 2.2 Student Voices

Much has already been deservedly written about the amazing, brilliant, innovative, education-based conference, Educon 2.2, at the Science Leadership Academy in the School District of Philadelphia that took place on January 29, 30, and 31, 2010. IMHO, Educon truly could not have had the degree of success it did without authentic, hands on SLA student involvement in virtually every aspect of the program. This video is a compilation of some of those student voices and their take on why Educon is important to them, their school, and to the world of education. They are truly a tribute to the tremendous work of Mr. Chris Lehman, Principal at SLA.  Take a look...

Good article in today's Philadelphia Inquirer about Educon, here.

Educon 2.2

Today, Guerilla Educators conducts a "conversation" around Educational Commissioning at Educon 2.2.  Our conversation description is as follows:

World-class teaching and learning can, and perhaps should, take place under a tree. With this in mind, our conversation will focus on the essential non-difference between the physical facility (the school) and the teaching and learning that takes place inside of those spaces (the School). We will explore and build on the idea that the educational facility can be used as a 5 dimensional (including time and cyberspace), hands-on teaching and learning tool to achieve academic and civic objectives.

Our Essential Question then, is:

In a wired world unfettered by the geography of place, how do we design teaching and learning spaces to accommodate the education that takes place outside of the physical walls of the "school"?

Follow up tomorrow...

Educon 2.2 List of Attendees

The Educon 2.2 list of attendees is quite impressive with 500 of the world's most innovative educators coming together in Philadelphia on January 29, 30, and 31 at the Science Leadership Academy High School.  There will be more than 50 conversations covering the  gamut of 21st century teaching and learning best practices.  John Sole, CEO of Guerilla Educators has the privilege of leading one of those conversations focused on Educational Commissioning and Project Based Learning and using the physical facility, the school itself, as a 5 dimensional (including time and cyberspace) teaching and learning tool.  Look for us on Saturday, January 30, Session 3 at 2:30-4:00 pm, in Room 209.

See you at Educon!

Friendship Tech Prep Academy Student Energy Projects

 On November 20, 2009, under the auspices of the Alliance to Save Energy and Guerilla Educators students at Friendship Tech Prep Academy conducted energy conservation projects at their school in the Anacostia section of Washington, DC.  Every student learned about energy use and conservation, then every student was able to actually test for, hands-on, and gather data around wattage, light levels, temperature, and energy loads of incandescent, cfl, and led bulbs.  This took an extraordinary degree of commitment, cooperation, and collaboration on the part of the admin team and those hard working teachers and really demonstrates the effective leadership of Principal Natalie Gordon and Vice Principal Widelene Desarmes that makes Tech Prep an oasis of academic and social stability in a very challenging neighborhood.

Special thanks to the Alliance's Emily Curley whose hard work made this extraordinary day possible.

Take a look...

Click here to see video of Friendship Charter Schools Professional Development around Project Based Learning that preceded the student project activities.  The training was conducted by Guerilla Educators.

Educon 2.2

We are pleased to announce that John Sole, President and CEO of Guerilla Educators in collaboration with the architect, David Schrader will be leading a "conversation" at Educon 2.2, one of the most innovative and important educational conferences taking place in the country.  Our starting point of the conversation is Educational Commissioning.

Conversation Description: The main idea is that, in a perfect pedagogical world there is an essential non-difference between the physical facility (the school) and the teaching and learning that takes place inside the walls (the School). Our conversation will focus on how the structure of the school, the very walls, should be a 3 dimensional teaching and learning tool. We will also take a look at how students should be involved from the very beginning of the school design process both to authentically inform educational facilities design and to use the design process as a powerful "real time" method to achieve rigorous grade appropriate curricular and civic proficiencies.

Conversational Practice: Authentic Youtube style video examples of students conducting architecture projects across the grades and participating in school design charrettes will frame and contextualize the conversations. We will also use the physical facility of the SLA with the participants as a vehicle to demonstrate the permeable nature between teaching and learning and the structure where that takes place.

Educon 2.2 will be held between January 29 - 31 at Science Leadership Academy, in Philadelphia.

Friendship Tech Prep Charter School Professional Development

Day 2 of the Friendship Tech Prep Academy Charter School Project Based Service Learning Workshop, presented by Guerilla Educators consisted in large part, of authentic hands-on demonstrations (thanks to Emily Curley of the Alliance to Save Energy) of what the participants learned in Day 1 about the Project Based methodologies.  Take a look...  Under the leadership of Ms Natalie Gordon, the Principal and co-founder of Friendship Tech, educators there took part in this Professional Development which was designed to give them the tools to conduct hands-on projects with their students.  Special thanks also to Ms Alicia Adams, Director of Professional Development for Friendship Charter Schools.  Good luck in your first year of operation, Tech!