Guide to the Simon Fraser University Summer Institute 2012 sponsored by Faculty of Education Community Graduate Programs Centre

for the Study of Educational Leadership and Policy The SFU Summer Institute will be held July 12 to July 14 at the Surrey campus. This Guide to the Summer Institute describes its purpose, format and contents. The sections of the Guide are linked to the following Table of Contents. Table of Contents Purpose Theme Participation Program Keynotes CSELP Invited Contributors Poster Sessions Concurrent Sessions Registration to Attend Registration to Present Appendix: Introduction to the Theme of the Summer Institute Additional questions and suggestions can be directed to Bruce Beairsto at jbeairst@sfu.ca. There is a web site for the Institute at http://ocs.sfu.ca/leadingchange/index.php/lc/21CenturyLearning, which provides additional information and allows for registration and proposals to present at the Institute. Attendance at the Summer Institute is open to all and free of charge. Purpose The Summer Institute is intended to enrich graduate programs by introducing students to selected presenters (scholars and researchers; education leaders and policymakers); allowing them to share their own projects and scholarship; and providing a forum for them to discuss their learning with each other. The Institute includes aspects that focus on both K-12 and post-secondary issues, as well as formal and informal learning settings.
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Theme The Theme for the 2012 Summer Institute is 21st Century Learning? The question mark in the title is intended to indicate that the Institute will interrogate this currently popular term in a variety of ways, particularly with respect to the claim that there is a need to broaden the aims of education in order to adequately prepare students for the future, and to deepen engagement in order to achieve them. The following questions are of particular interest in the context of wide-spread attention to personalized learning and experiential learning in order to develop 21st Century Skills across the K-16 system. What are the implications for teaching and learning? What are the implications for policy and governance? What are the implications for curriculum? What are the implications for leadership? A brief introduction to the theme is appended to this Guide.
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Participation It is hoped that all community program cohorts will include participation in the Summer Institute as part of their class hours. This participation can take several forms. All cohorts are invited to host one or more of the concurrent sessions (as interest dictates). This may be done by, for example, bringing in a guest speaker relevant to the cohorts interests or perhaps providing a forum for the cohort members to present on some aspect of the Institute theme that is related to its focus. These sessions are designed to help the cohorts either expand their own learning, or share their scholarship as a group with other conference participants. Cohorts in their final year typically attend the full Institute, with each student presenting a Poster outlining their field study or culminating project. Community members, faculty, and individual students, or groups of students, are also encouraged to host a concurrent session. This session might present their own research or might involve other participants in that research.
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Program The Institute begins with an opening Keynote at 7:00 pm on Thursday, July 12, and continues on Friday and Saturday with opening Keynotes followed by a series of concurrent sessions each day. Student Poster Presentations are on display in the mezzanine throughout the Institute and students are present to explain their posters during the lunch break each day. The Institute concludes with a hosted reception on Saturday afternoon. The schedule for Friday and Saturday will be as follows 8:00 8:45 10:15 10:30 11:30 11:45 12:45 1:45 2:45 3:00 4:00 Registration and Poster Setup Keynote Break Concurrent Session Break Concurrent Session Lunch (on your own) and Poster Sessions (on the Mezzanine) Concurrent Session Break Concurrent Session Adjourn

On Saturday there will be a closing reception and during this time we will draw for some fabulous prizes, including an iPad. However, you must be registered and present to win.
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Keynotes The opening Keynote on Thursday evening, New Technology and Student Learning, will be co-presented by Eric Jordan, past president of the Premiers Technology Council, and Dr. Kevin ONeill of SFU. This will be followed by a hosted reception. The Friday morning Keynote, Making Learning Meaningful, will be shared by Dr. Gillian Judson and Dr. Sharon Bailin of SFU, each of whom will provide a perspective on how learning can be personalized in order to deepen engagement. The Saturday morning keynote will be given by Dr. Peggy Patterson from the University of Calgary, who is currently Director of the Canadian Centre for the Study of Higher Education.
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CSELP Invited Lectures The Centre for the Study of Educational Leadership and Policy, which is one of the sponsors of the Summer Institute, has also invited two individuals to give concurrent sessions. Dr. Norm Friesen from Thompson Rivers University, who is the Canadian Research Chair in E-Learning Practices, will provide a session on Friday and Chris Wejr, who is principal of Kent Elementary in Agassiz and one of Canadas most followed Tweeters and Bloggers, will provide a session on Saturday.
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Poster Sessions Students who are graduating from the MEd or EdD programs and for whom a Poster Presentation of their research or cap stone projects is required will have their Posters on display during the Summer Institute. These will be on display on the mezzanine all day Friday and Saturday. Box lunches will be provided for these students so that they can available during the lunch periods to discuss their Posters. Other students may present a poster. All students who are presenting posters must register on the conference web site and provide a title and description of their work for inclusion in the conference brochure.
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Concurrent Sessions Cohorts, individuals and groups are invited to provide concurrent sessions of one hour on Friday or Saturday. To propose a concurrent session, please register on the conference web site. Proposals for concurrent sessions will be reviewed on June 5th, and by June 8th an initial timetable of sessions will be compiled and each session proponent will receive an individual response.
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Registration to Attend This year participants will not be asked to pre-register. However, we will be asking all instructors to advise us of their class attendance to assist in our planning. When students arrive for the conference, there will be a welcome desk at which they can pick up program information and a name tag.
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Registration to Present Individuals and groups (including full cohorts) who wish to host a concurrent session will have to first register on the conference site in order to submit their proposal. To register, go to http://ocs.sfu.ca/leadingchange/index.php/lc/21CenturyLearning/schedConf/cfp .
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Introduction to the Summer Institute Theme: 21st Century Learning? SFU Summer Institute, July 12-14, 2012

There is a perception across the Western world that students will not be adequately prepared for the future if we simply continue to do what has been successful in the past. This is not because standards are fallingthey are notbut because the world is changing so rapidly. This problem was formally identified as early as 1996 in a study prepared for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Learning: The Treasure Within, commonly known as the Delors Report, concluded that the complex issues facing the world at the end of the second millennium required students to be not only proficient in the traditional academic curriculum but to also have the personal skills needed to thrive in a world of diversity, dilemma and disruption. They called the desired educational outcomes in terms of four pillarslearning to be, learning to know, learning to do and learning to live together. These became known as 21st Century Skills and since then that label has been used to describe a great number of specific sets of learning outcomes that share the same general characteristics. Broadly speaking, it means augmenting the traditional 3Rs with greater attention to outcomes such as critical thinking, creativity, communications, collaboration and global citizenship. Although there all many specific versions of 21st Century Skills around the world, they all have the same basic nature and purposeto enhance education outcomes by augmenting academic knowledge with the transferable skills and habits of mind they require in order to apply their knowledge to the complex challenges of a rapidly changing, and shrinking, global community. These broader and higher standards will require increased levels of student engagement. Diligence is not sufficient for the transformational ideals of 21st Century Learning. Students must be genuinely committed to their learning, and must take greater personal responsibility for it. In order to increase student engagement, educators are seeking ways to personalize learning and to embed it in authentic experiences so that students understand its relevance to them and can, in age appropriate ways, formulate and answer their own questionsthrough the curriculum and in their life beyond schooling. This direction is evident in the BC Education Plan for K-12 ( to better prepare students for the future there will be more emphasis on key competencies like self-reliance, critical thinking, inquiry, creativity, problem solving, innovation, teamwork and collaboration [and schools will] connect students more directly with the world outside of school, with increased focus on learning these skills across topic areas.) and also in the Academic Plan for SFU (SFU graduates will understand the importance of being ethical, responsible and informed citizens, through engaging in complex contemporary issues and examining questions from different perspectives.)

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The BC Education Plan The recently released BC Education Plan is our provinces vision for personalizing learning in the K-12 system in order to achieve 21st Century Learning goals. The Ministry has described the plan as a compass rather than a mapin other words, it is a work in progressand has invited all stakeholders to participate in determining how the goals that it describes can best be achieved. The challenge which the plan addresses is: an education system designed in the very different circumstances of an earlier century cant possibly always meet the challenges students face both now and in the future. The opportunity it foresees is: to build on the many strengths of our existing education system while modernizing education so it can adapt and respond to students needs [and to] get from good to great as we bring personalized learning into classrooms. The BC Education Plan can be found at http://www.bcedplan.ca/.

The SFU Academic Plan The Academic Plan for SFU addresses goals ranging from financial stability to student experience. As it pertains to student experience, it commits to implementing recommendations from an earlier Task Force on Teaching and Learning (http://goo.gl/GYc9j). The task force made a range of proposals to increase the value attributed to teaching and to increase the quality of teaching by Expanding student-centered approaches to teaching within a process of ongoing improvement [in order to] clarify expectations for student learning, provide more opportunities for experiential learning and learning that extends beyond the classroom, and build on the synergies among teaching, learning and research. The current Academic Plan and the draft plan for 2013-16 can be found at http://goo.gl/bvKaT. The Summer Institutes Purpose The Summer Institute will address the following questions in the context of wide-spread attention to personalized learning and experiential learning in order to develop 21st Century Skills across the K-16 system. What are the implications for teaching and learning? What are the implications for policy and governance? What are the implications for curriculum? What are the implications for leadership?