Brian Gough, M. Ed, Interactive Media Facilitator, Satellite Center
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As an educator entering my 22nd year in education and 13th year as an NTN PBL based educator, I can say that I am just as excited about attending NTAC 2017 as I was when I began my career. NTAC is a place where I can meet like-minded, innovative educators from all over the globe and share experiences, project ideas, new teaching tools, and more in just a few days; However, it doesn’t end there. I can take these contacts over to the digital world and continue connecting with the people I met, find other connections and continue the conversations started at NTAC throughout the year using NTN’s community tools built into Echo. This is a conference that I look forward to attending every year!
The reason I look forward to NTAC every year is that this conference makes me feel like an important piece of the innovation wave sweeping the institution of education. Between the speakers, other educators, the NTN staff, and experiences gained from sessions, NTAC is always the place that jumpstarts my school year and gives me the energy and ideas I need to stay innovative in my approach and allow me to grow as an individual. In addition, the conference gives our Satellite Center family the ability to get away from all distractions, bond as a team, and time to focus on new techniques and brainstorm how we will integrate our new ideas into the upcoming school year. Our group knows the meaning of the terms “Hard Fun” & “Serious Play”, and we take them both seriously. We will make sure we have a good time at NTAC17.
On a side note, being part of NTN since 2005 has allowed me to see the growth and changes in the network over the past 12 years. When I started Paul Curtis and Tim Presiado where our initial trainers, Art Pufford provided our “admin” training in Napa for Lotus Notes, and there were only a fraction of the schools in the network than exist today. Sometimes I long for the smallness of those “old days” and the adreneline that came with starting a new site from stratch by “building it as we flew”. However, not many organizations can say that as they increased in size and scale, the quality of services and product increased over time. I credit this with to an orginzation that mirrors the silicon valley tech environment that helped give birth to the New Tech Network. Finding ways to grow, but still feel the connection that comes with a small community seems to be the model for the future. While it has not been all unicorns and rainbows along the way, the journey has been fun and rewarding for the past 12 years, and I look forward to seeing what happens in the next 12.
You can follow Brian on Twitter at @intellectualbum.