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63rd Annual SECA Conference
Hyatt Regency San Antonio
San Antonio, TX
February 2-4, 2012
Online registration for SECA 2012 is now CLOSED.
Please register on-site at the conference. Thank you.
Follow @SECA2012 on Twitter and join the conversation via hashtag #SECA2012
Scroll down for more information.
Click above to view the full
2012 Conference Program.
All exhibit space has been reserved.
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All exhibit space has been reserved.
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| Keynote Speakers |
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Greg Johnson,
Chef and Father, Greg Johnson, has been cooking professionally for 20 years. He is a graduate of the California Culinary Academy and has worked in some of the finest restaurants in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Hawaii, Mexico and Seattle. His love of food has brought him around the world studying cuisine in France, Italy, England, Spain, and Mexico. For the past 11 years Chef Greg has been a Private Chef for some of the Northwest’s most high profile families.
Presently, as the co-founder of Create Change Studios, Greg is inspiring families to come back to the table with his DVD series Chef and Father and website, www.chefandfather.com. Chef and Father helps parents with step-by-step instructions on cooking for your family from a Chef’s point of view. He is also co-producer of a children’s music CD with musician Adam Wood as well as working on various documentaries bringing Chefs and farmers together.
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Dr. Michael H. Levine, Ph.D.
Michael Levine is the founding director of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, an action research and innovation lab devoted to harnessing the potential of digital media to advance young children's learning and healthy development. Prior to joining the Center, Dr. Levine served as Vice President of New Media and Executive Director of Education for Asia Society, managing the global nonprofit's interactive media and educational initiatives to promote understanding of Asia and other world regions, languages and cultures. Previously, Dr. Levine oversaw Carnegie Corporation of New York's groundbreaking work in early childhood development, educational media and primary grades reform, and was a senior advisor to the New York City Schools Chancellor, where he directed dropout prevention, afterschool, and early childhood initiatives. Dr. Levine serves as an informal adviser to the White House, the U.S. Department of Education, PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and writes for policy-oriented groups such as the National Governors Association, Democracy Journal and Education Week. He was named by Working Mother magazine as one of America's most influential leaders in shaping family and children's policy and serves on numerous nonprofit boards and advisory councils, including the Forum for Youth Investment, Teach For America, the US Department of Agriculture's Healthy Apps Challenge, and Talaris Institute.
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Sharon MacDonald
Sharon has been training teachers for more than 20 years throughout the United States on a variety of early childhood topics. Her training is based on her unique perspective from 28 years as an early-childhood teacher. Her practical ideas, down-to-earth approaches, and her enthusiastic presentation style will energize and delight you. You will be able to implement many of her ideas in your classroom right away.
Sharon is a transplanted Mississippian living in San Antonio, Texas with her husband, George. She has two adult children: Brad and Meg, who, as youngsters, were her guinea pigs for all of her songs and activities.
Sharon is a frequent keynote and featured speaker at national and state early-childhood conferences. She has written many teacher resource books and children's stories, as well as articles that have been published in variety of early childhood magazines.
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Dr. Pam Schiller
Brain Compatible Strategies
Has medical research changed how we understand child development? As research findings about how the brain develops and functions continue to emerge, researchers are bringing to light significant findings that have direct application to our interactions with children, including curriculum. Dr. Schiller will highlight new findings and offer suggestions for strategies that will help with program implementation.
Pam Schiller is a freelance Early Childhood Consultant and Author. Dr. Schiller has been a childcare administrator for several years and has also taught in the public schools as a kindergarten teacher. She served as Head of the Early Childhood Department at the University of Houston where she also directed the Lab School.
Dr. Schiller shares her extensive knowledge in workshops, radio and television interviews, and as a popular keynote speaker and author. She is Senior Author of the DLM Early Childhood Express, a full curriculum for for four year olds, the DLM Early Childhood Program, a full curriculum for Kindergarten and Early Impressions: Start Smart Edition, a full curriculum for infants and toddlers.
Pam is also the author of several children's books, music CD's, DVD's and more than thirty teacher resource books for Gryphon House, Goodyear Books, SRA/McGraw-Hill, and Fearon Teaching Aids.
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Featured Sessions |
 We Dig Dirt and Using Your Outdoor Classroom by Nature Explore
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Sponsored by Lakeshore Learning Materials
We Dig Dirt: Additional Strategies for Supporting Infants and Toddlers in Outdoor Classrooms
Discover effective ways to facilitate meaningful infant and toddler learning experiences inspired by nature. Gain positive solutions for addressing some of the challenges of working with very young children outdoors. Many practical ideas for helping infants and toddlers grow up with a sense of wonder will be shared.
Using Your Outdoor Classroom
Through fun and engaging hands-on experiences, you will gain techniques for using outdoor classrooms as an integral part of preschool and elementary children's daily learning. Discover how well-designed outdoor spaces facilitate children's overall development in traditional academic areas, strengthen specific skills, and aid social-emotional growth. Explore a variety of motivating strategies for facilitating and assessing student learning in outdoor classrooms, and reaching a variety of interests and needs.
Nature Explore is a collaborative program of the Arbor Day Foundation and Dimensions Educational Research Foundation. The goal of this comprehensive, research-based initiative is to help children and families develop a profound engagement with the natural world, where nature is an integral, joyful part of children’s daily learning.
 Environmental Rating Scales Institute with Debby Cryer, Ph.D.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Debby Cryer, Ph.D. is a leading expert in the early childhood field and one of the authors of the Environment Rating Scales. Dr. Cryer is currently a scientist at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Session 1: The research behind the rating scales.
In this session, the 3 components of quality (Protection of Health and Safety, Opportunities for Appropriate Learning, and Chances to Form Positive Relationships) that the scales are actually measuring will be discussed. These areas will be illustrated, providing details about what is required and the research requirements are based upon. Research on proving reliability will be included. Research on the validity of the scales will also be discussed, since the findings of this research which has been integrated into revised editions of all scales.
Session 2: Relating curriculum development to assessments of quality
In this session, information will be provided on how curriculum affects the assessed quality of programs, and how the content of the specific curriculum, plus the extent to which a curriculum is actually implemented, affects the comprehensive quality required for positive development in all children. The curriculum All About preschoolers, an ECERS-based curriculum, will be used to illustrate important aspects of curriculum development.
 2012 Public Policy Luncheon with Texas State Representative Mike Villarreal
"Raising Revenue to Raise Healthy & Educated Chidlren"
State Representative Mike Villarreal was born and raised in San Antonio Texas. His father immigrated to the United States from Mexico with his family as a child. His mother is a product of the Edgewood community on the West Side of San Antonio. Together they taught their children the importance of earning an education, working hard and aspiring for a better life.
Mike’s parents sent him to Catholic schools: St. Luke’s Catholic Elementary and Central Catholic High School. While at Central, he began taking classes at San Antonio College. He went on to receive an economics degree at Texas A&M University and later earned a master’s in public policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.
Mike's professional background is in finance. He has worked at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, JP Morgan Securities. He currently directs the San Antonio office for Public Financial Management, the nation's leading public finance advisory firm.
In 1999, Mike launched a grassroots campaign for the Texas House of Representatives. His prior elected experience was serving as vice president of his neighborhood association in Beacon Hill. To win his election, Mike knocked on over 4,000 doors to meet his voters one-on-one. On election night, Mike won by one vote, defeating a judge backed by the local political establishment.
Mike is in his 6th term at the State Capitol advancing a public agenda that invests in education, protects our quality of life and environment, values work and aspiration, and ensures that government is accountable to citizens. Mike is known as a lawmaker who listens to all sides, studies the issues, and reaches his own independent decisions.
Mike is married to Jeanne Russell. They are raising two children, Bella and Marcos.
Mike brings a great sense of humor to his work. He lived in a state park during the 80th legislative session when the state was renewing its parks department. He appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart poking fun at proposed legislation to regulate sexy cheerleading. |
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