Organized by a consortium of four scientific societies with a collective membership of nearly 20,000, the inaugural Life Discovery Conference will take place at the University of Minnesota, St. Paul, from March 15-16, 2013. The conference is part of the consortium's Digital Resource Discovery project, led by Teresa Mourad, Director of Education and Diversity Programs at the Ecological Society of America.
"This will really be a small working conference," said Jeff Corney, conference local host and managing director of the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve. "It's structured to promote the use of digital resources and new technologies, publish classroom-friendly resources in LifeDiscoveryEd Digital Library and emphasize research-rich biology education." Peer working groups will give educators feedback on lesson plans or activities during education share fair roundtables held during the conference. "Our vision is to offer a session format where educators and scientists can present their digital resources to their peers for feedback by submitting a draft entry into the digital library," explains Corney. "We hope that in this manner, they will quickly understand the issues for high quality education and incorporate suggestions and ideas by their peers." Another goal envisioned by the partnering organizations is to encourage communities of practice. "We really want to foster greater interaction between educators and scientists," said Thomas Meagher, Conference Planning Chair and professor at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. "These groups have so much to learn from each other and together can greatly enhance our mutual desire for greater hands-on, data-driven biology in the classrooms." Read more on ESA's EcoTone blog: http://www.esa.org/esablog/ecologist-2/ecology-education/educators-scientists-to-swap-ideas-for-a-robust-biology-classroom/ More info about the conference: http://www.esa.org/ldc/ Nadine Lymn ESA Director of Public Affairs Washington DC 20036 (202) 833-8773 x205 https://twitter.com/esa_org https://www.facebook.com/esa.org
