Leading Common Core Expert to Give Free Training Webinar

Salt Lake City, UT (PRWEB) November 01, 2011

Curtis Linton has worked in education most of his life. Back in the early 90’s, when Curtis was in high school, his parents founded Video Journal of Education, a company dedicated to giving every teacher access to the best classroom practices. More than twenty years later the company name has changed—it’s now called School Improvement Network—and its reach has grown, serving nearly twenty percent of the teachers in the country, but to Curtis, it will always be the family start-up of his youth.

“When other kids were throwing parties and going to football games,” Curtis remembers, “my parents would put all their kids in a van and drive them around the country, filming teachers in their classrooms. It was a great way to grow up.”

“But for as fun as it was,” Curtis continues, “it exposed me to some of the grim realities of education at a young age: underfunded schools, enormous achievement gaps, and teachers working hard to play catch up. There’s no way that I could have witnessed some of the things that I saw and not have taken action.”

As a response to his experiences, Curtis has written a book called Equity 101: The Equity Framework, and coauthored Courageous Conversations about Race with Glenn Singleton. Now, as Vice President of School Improvement Network, and a renowned expert in education, Linton spends his time traveling, advocating, and speaking to leaders about how to improve schools.

“There have been plenty of incredible innovations in education over the years,” says Curtis, “but of all the movements that have come along in the last few decades, the one that excites me most is the new Common Core Standards. This initiative is going to change the way we reach our students.”

“The Standards have been adopted in 44 states now,” continues Curtis, “but there is still a sense among some educators out there that this is going to be another program that hinders as much as it helps. While I can understand some hesitance, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Our company has made it a goal to help educators catch the vision of core curriculum—to understand why it exists, what its functions are, and how to use it to elevate student achievement.”

As part of his work to promote the Common Core Standards, Curtis will be putting on a free webinar entitled “Why, What, and How.” The webinar will focus on the rationale behind the creation of the Common Core initiative, talk about how the Standards provide an opportunity to close achievement gaps, and lay out what educators need to know to effectively integrate the Common Core into their schools and classrooms over the next few years.

“I’m excited to share my experience with educators, and to help them see how they and their students stand to benefit from the Common Core Standards,” says Curtis. It’s a big change, but with training, it’s going to make a world of difference.”

Curtis Linton’s “Why, What, and How” webinar will run from 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. Mountain Daylight Time on Thursday, November 3, 2011. It will include a 30-40 minute presentation, supported by digital media (PowerPoint, video, graphic files) and end with a 15- to 20-minute “question and answer” session. At the webinar’s conclusion, audio and video material will be posted for viewing on http://www.commoncore360.com.

The Common Core Webinar series by Common Core 360 is free and open to the public. Register today by visiting http://www.commoncore360.com/webinars.php and choosing the desired webinar.

Be sure to register for School Improvement’s Thursday, November 10 webinar, “Translating ELA Standards,” presented by Dr. Ann Johnson, and stay tuned for upcoming free Common Core webinars as they are posted on http://www.commoncore360.com.

About School Improvement Network

Founded in 1991 by teachers, the School Improvement Network provides comprehensive, research-based professional development anytime, anywhere. As the home of The Video Journal of Education, PD 360, Observation 360, the Learning 360 Framework, Equity 360, and Common Core 360, School Improvement Network resources focus on the most relevant topics, feature the top experts, and show educators how to put theory into practice. School Improvement Network works with thousands of schools and districts in every state and around the world and has visited over 3,000 classrooms to document best practices in action. Learn more at http://www.schoolimprovement.com.

About Common Core 360

Common Core 360 is the leading online, on-demand professional Common Core learning resource for schools and districts. It answers the questions that 3.4 million teachers are asking about how to make the Standards work in their classroom every day. Common Core 360 gives administrators, teachers, and instructional coaches the necessary resources to turn State Standards into measurable student achievement. The unique training, expert analysis, and real classroom examples of putting the Standards into practice all comes from the same minds that designed PD 360, the world’s largest online professional development platform. Common Core 360 is directly integrated with PD 360, so educators have a single sign-in solution for the professional development they need to move forward in the 21st century classroom. Learn more at http://www.schoolimprovement.com/products/common-core-360/.

About PD 360 • Practical, Scalable, Measurable

PD 360 is the multi-award winning, leading online, on-demand professional learning resource for schools and districts. With 1,800 videos on 117 topics from 120 experts, PD 360 has the largest online community of educators, with over 700,000 subscribers. The innovative PD 360 videos are unique and class-leading because of the quality of production, and each is research-based with classroom examples of best practices. The videos are also relatively short in nature (approximately 6-12 minutes in length) allowing educators access to “snack-able” content that is easy and accessible to view and integrate.

Teachers, administrators, professional learning communities, coaches, mentors, instructional leaders, and paraprofessionals have available at their fingertips hundreds of indexed and searchable video segments that present real, best-practice classroom examples and feature respected education experts, such as Michael Fullan, Rick DuFour, Doug Reeves, Rick Stiggins, and many others. Educators can instantly find the help they need on nearly every topic, including differentiation, assessment, English language learners, leadership, and more. PD 360 can also be used to create a structured learning experience for an individual teacher, a PLC, or even an entire school. PD 360 bridges the gap between training and classroom integration with job-embedded follow-up, tracking, and reflection tools. PD 360 gives educators access to an online community of teaching professionals that allows interaction and collaboration either within a district or across the United States and the world. PD 360 includes over 1,500 research-based video learning segments and is the most comprehensive web-based library of professional development resources available. See a demonstration at http://www.pd360.com.

School Improvement Network, PD 360, and their respective logos are trademarks of the School Improvement Network. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Press Contact:

Duane Sprague

School Improvement Network

801-758-9546

duane.sprague(at)schoolimprovement(dot)com

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