Talk About NECC 2009: Post-Conference Recaps, Take-Aways, Brainstorms, and Conversations

NECC 2009 wrapped up last week, but more than ever we have a chance to capture, as the "audience" or "community" who participated in or followed the show, our thoughts and feelings about what took place. For those parts of the conference that have been "community-generated" (like EduBloggerCon and NECC Unplugged) this is highly practical, as we can try to capture thoughts and ideas for when we start planning next for next year (at which point the conference will be called the ISTE Conference and not NECC, by the way). For the formal parts of the conference that are fully under the control of ISTE (starting with the keynote speakers to everything else), it's a chance for us to give really proactive feedback to an organization that has shown itself very open to both the conversations and the technologies that allow this. My own "grading" of my experiences at NECC I've put in another post.

I am going to use this blog post as a flexible starting place, both to schedule live Elluminate sessions on specific aspects of the conference, and to point to other places where there are discussions already taking place. I'lll start with the events that I had some responsibility for and will gladly expand from there to other events or aspects of the conference that you feel deserve a live "drill-down" session. I'll also post all these sessions in LearnCentral.org's community calendar so you can check there as well.

If you want to set up your own post-NECC discussion in Elluminate, let me know in the comments below! Please also let me know if there are other conversations taking place that I need to link to.

"WHAT WE LEARNED AT NECC"
This is a general brain dump, well-suited for those who attended and those who did not. Not about logistics at all, but just a chance to talk about the learning. What were the significant "aha" moments for you? What speakers spoke to you?

• Elluminate Live Session: Saturday, July 11th, from 8am Pacific (11am Eastern) for one hour, just before the Classroom 2.0 LIVE show on Glogster. Log in at http://tinyurl.com/necctalk2 (THIS IS A CHANGE FROM THE ORIGINALLY ANNOUNCED ROOM!)
• LearnCentral Conversation: http://www.learncentral.org/forums/professional-development/what-we-learned-necc
• NECC / ISTE Ning Conversations: http://www.necc2008.org/
  

"NECC 2009 CONFERENCE FEEDBACK SESSION"

• Elluminate Live Session: (UPDATED!) Monday, July 13th, at 4:00 pm Pacific (7:00pm Eastern). Anita McAnear from ISTE joins us to talk about your experiences at NECC! Log in at http://tinyurl.com/necc09talk

"EDUBLOGGERCON, BLOGGERS' CAFE, AND NECC UNPLUGGED -- FEEDBACK AND BRAINSTORMING"

• Elluminate Live Session: Wednesday, July 8th, at 6pm Pacific (9pm Eastern) for one hour, immediately following the Future of Education session with Maria Droujkova on Math 2.0 that evening. We'll talk about lessons learned, the logistics, and what we want to do next year around these programs. Log in at http://tinyurl.com/necc09talk

• LearnCentral Conversation: http://www.learncentral.org/forums/professional-development/edubloggercon-bloggers-cafe-and-necc-unplugged-feedback-brainstormin
  

"OPEN SOURCE PAVILION, SPEAKER SERIES, AND NEXT YEAR'S OPENSOURCECON"
This is our fourth year running the Open Source Pavilion, and it's never been so popular. Let us know what you liked and what you didn't, and help us plan for next year. We're especially interested in running a free, all-day OpenSourceCon (like EduBloggerCon) "unconference" next year--what do you think? Would you come?

• Elluminate Live Session: Friday, July 10th, 1:00pm Pacific / 4:00pm Eastern. http://tinyurl.com/necc09talk
• LearnCentral Conversation: http://www.learncentral.org/forums/professional-development/necc-open-source-pavilion-speaker-series-and-next-years-opensourceco
  

Hope you'll participate and make your perspective known!