School Improvement Services

How the Pandemic made you an Awesome Educator

You’ve just accomplished something that has never been done by any other generation of educators. Now it’s time to reflect on our past experience and realize we are in a new chapter of education. The pandemic made you a superhero. Now it’s time to use these skills, ideas and passion to move education forward for our students as we prepare them for their future, not out past.

Jeff Utecht is the founder of Shifting Schools, the host and producer of the companion podcast (SOS Podcast), and a designer of professional learning experiences. Jeff has up-skilled more than 55,000 educators around the world. He’s been a keynote speaker at dozens of events globally, and he’s consulted with over 200 School Districts. Learn more about Jeff’s philosophy, publications, and opportunities to work with your school at jeffutecht.com.

Getting Social with Students 
Let’s face it, kids are social and they want to connect! They want to connect with each other, with their teachers, with their school at large. This will be a discussion on the use of social networking tools with student bodies to engage them in learning, foster school spirit, and just have fun! We take a look at how some schools are using social networks to communicate with students as well as the school community at large. Come with ideas to share, questions on how to get started, and be ready to take a look at social-networks through the eyes of kids today.
Jeff Utecht
Jeff Utecht is the founder of Shifting Schools, the host and producer of the companion podcast (SOS Podcast), and a designer of professional learning experiences. Jeff has up-skilled more than 55,000 educators around the world. He’s been a keynote speaker at dozens of events globally, and he’s consulted with over 200 School Districts. Learn more about Jeff’s philosophy, publications, and opportunities to work with your school at jeffutecht.com.

NGSS Assessments
This session will center on ways to assess NGSS standards K-12 using technology.  Participants will have the opportunity to see some prebuilt assessments as well as to build a few of their own.  The goal is to walk away with some assessment questions already built and the know-how to build even more.
Ben DeCarlow Teacher Butte Falls Charter School
I have taught middle school science for the last seven years. In that time, I have worked to create and refine assessments that can be used for NGSS that mirror the OSAS test. I also have overseen science instruction at Butte Falls’ Natural Resource Center, an outdoor hub of science learning for all ages.

The STEAM Dream
From 5-minute morning bins to integrated project based challenges, there is so much we can do in a classroom to provide STEAM learning experiences. We will discuss content integration and organizing standards-based STEAM activities. Then we will take a close look at structuring STEAM stations, setting up morning STEAM bins, and facilitating integrated project-based STEAM challenges during this hands-on session.
Becky Van Duker Teacher Medford School District
Becky is currently a Classroom Teacher with experience as an Instructional Specialist in the Medford School District. She is passionate about engaging students in hands-on, inquiry based learning, putting together cross-curricular classroom transformations, and utilizing technology in ways that encourage creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. She is eager to collaborate with teachers on strategies to support all students as they find success and develop a passion for learning.

SOESD lending library – Introduction to Drones in the Classroom
Introduction to some of the resources at the SOESD STEM Hub’s lending library. Come discover and play with drones and robots. Learn how to integrate them into a project-based lesson on space exploration.
Amy Maukonen Academic Director The Valley School of Southern Oregon

Gabriel Hildreth and Amy Maukonen are middle school educators at The Valley School, a public charter school in Medford. Gabriel has taught many exploratory STEM classes including video game production, student newsroom, architecture, tiny home modeling, product design, and digital music production. Gabriel has also been flying drones for the past 8 years. He is passionate about bringing drone technology into the classroom to teach students how to implement code blocks and python to piot drones in various. Gabriel is excited to bring his passion into the classroom to find more ways to get students excited and engaged in learning. Amy Maukonen is the founder of the Project Based school, currently serving as the Education Director. Amy holds a BS in science education and an MS in Special Education. Her mission is to create school cultures that honor students’ strengths and identities,  build confidence and self-efficacy through authentic learning experiences, and reduce inequities and gaps in STEAM. This session will be a demonstration of coding and piloting Tello drones – small, affordable drones that are easy, accessible entry points into flying drones. We will also have a Lego FlyBrix drone that students build and fly, learning electronics and physics involved with drone building. There will be time for trying out the drones and some lesson ideas on how to bring them into your classroom.

YouScience – Aptitudes Discovery for Career Guidance
Oregon’s Department of Education is funding 2 years of YouScience’s Brain Games Aptitude Assessment (Discovery) for public middle and high schools across the state! Attend this training session led by YouScience to see a walkthrough of how the brain games work, what is included, and how to get started at your school! The Discovery results show students their aptitudes, interests, career matches, post-secondary plans, local employers, WBL opportunities, and more!
Jerica McMahan
Jerica McMahan is a Manager, Customer Success at YouScience based in American Fork, Utah. Previously, Jerica was a Teacher at Bedford County Schools in Tennessee and has now been with YouScience for over 2 years. She works with all Oregon schools using YouScience to help them implement the program effectively.

Google Apps to Promote the 4 C’s
During this workshop, educators will discover how to use Google Apps in new and exciting ways to promote the use of the 4 C’s in their classrooms. We will look at creative and collaborative projects including interactive diagrams, digital comics, educational meme’s, students blogs, digital breakouts and collaborative timelines before creating some interactive projects of our own using slides, sites, drawings, sheets, and forms. We will examine student work samples, review project outlines and rubrics, and explore project templates.
Becky Van Duker Teacher Medford School District
Becky is currently a Classroom Teacher with experience as an Instructional Specialist in the Medford School District. She is passionate about engaging students in hands-on, inquiry based learning, putting together cross-curricular classroom transformations, and utilizing technology in ways that encourage creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. She is eager to collaborate with teachers on strategies to support all students as they find success and develop a passion for learning.

STEM Storytelling
“This workshop will guide attendees through interpreting a work of well-known literature through a STEM lens to create a lesson appropriate for elementary students. Attendees will participate in a hands-on activity, using a well-known children’s story as the inspiration for a STEM investigation.
Presenters will discuss opportunities for blending STEM investigations with literacy/Language Arts time and will discuss the elements of an engaging and high-quality activity. Participants will then will work in small groups to brainstorm their own story/STEM pairing, and will have an opportunity to share their ideas. ”
Ash Friend Education Director ScienceWorks Hands-On Museum
Ash heads the Education team at ScienceWorks Hands-On Museum. He designs and facilitates immersive hands-on STEAM content to excite adventurers of all ages with the goal of helping all learners see themselves as a designer, problem-solver, and scientist.

Introduction to OER & the Oregon Open Learning Hub
The Oregon Open Learning Hub is a digital resource repository and collaboration space for educators, administrators, and other educational partners to curate, create, and remix open educational resources (OER). In this introductory session, you will learn the why and the what of OER and the Hub, how to navigate and search for resources, and a few basics of open licensing.
In preparation for the workshop, it is recommended that you register for an OER Commons account. An account is not required to search and access resources on the site, but it is necessary in order to save resources to a group on the Oregon Open Learning Hub. Follow these steps to register.
Dr. Allie Ivey
Dr. Ivey is a Digital Learning Program Specialist at the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) where she supports schools and districts in designing and implementing online learning, hybrid learning, and blended learning with a focus on instructional design and pedagogical approaches. She has over 15 years of experience in the field of education having served as an elementary and middle school teacher, an instructional coach, a higher education instructor, and an assistant professor. Her passion is designing and facilitating professional development that supports equitable outcomes for all students.

Vanessa Clark
Vanessa is a Program Analyst for Digital Learning at the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) and the project lead for the Oregon Open Learning Hub. Vanessa brings enthusiasm for how Open Educational Resources (OER) can support equity, empowerment, and efficacy in the education community.

Tools to Enhance Student Voice
During this workshop, educators will learn how to take their use of Flipgrid and Padlet to the next level. Our work will focus on strategies to enhance student voice in the classroom. After exploring the two platforms, we will collaboratively brainstorm Flipgrid and Padlet topics that ask students to think critically and use their creativity. We will look at the versatile ways these tools can be utilized in any content area and discover the ways these platforms can provide students with opportunities to take an active role in their learning as their creativity is unleashed.
Becky Van Duker Teacher Medford School District
Becky is currently a Classroom Teacher with experience as an Instructional Specialist in the Medford School District. She is passionate about engaging students in hands-on, inquiry based learning, putting together cross-curricular classroom transformations, and utilizing technology in ways that encourage creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. She is eager to collaborate with teachers on strategies to support all students as they find success and develop a passion for learning.

Industry Report: Technology in Careers
This session will bring industry professionals from Southern Oregon sharing about how they use technology in the workplace. Session will include an introduction from the moderator, introductions, sharing about technology being used, sharing about exploration opportunities available for students to engage in career connected learning, and questions and answers.
Karla Clark Program Manager for STE(A)M and CCL SOESD
Karla resides in the Rogue Valley for the past 15 years where she currently serves Jackson, Josephine and Klamath county through the SOESD’s School Improvement team providing STEAM and Career Connected Learning supports for educators and students. Karla has also run a small business in direct sales for many years and has several years prior experience in the restaurant industry, and spent 1 year on the road as a long haul truck driver. She served the United States Air Force as an Instructor for 7 years while she pursued her education in Workforce Education and Development. Hiking, reading and spending time with her daughter are Karla’s hobbies!

Using Google My Maps to Tell Stories, Gather Research and Learn Mapping Skills
Everyone knows Google Maps, but have you heard of My Maps? Come ready to geek out and learn all the ways your students can create maps not just use maps. When’s the last time you touched a paper map? Then why do we still have students coloring them! Digital maps are the future … let’s prepare them for their future, not our past.
Jeff Utecht
Jeff Utecht is the founder of Shifting Schools, the host and producer of the companion podcast (SOS Podcast), and a designer of professional learning experiences. Jeff has up-skilled more than 55,000 educators around the world. He’s been a keynote speaker at dozens of events globally, and he’s consulted with over 200 School Districts. Learn more about Jeff’s philosophy, publications, and opportunities to work with your school at jeffutecht.com.

Think Outside the Box with Talent Maker City (Double Session)
Think Outside the Box with Talent Maker City! Come learn all about Talent Maker City and how we utilize hands-on learning to engage students in making. We’ll explore some affordable and easy to implement programming as well as some of our higher tech projects. We’ll share a little bit about TMC and give you an opportunity to participate as a learner! This session is for both Elementary and Middle School educators.
Alli French Executive Director Talent Maker City
Alli is a long-time educator and maker – and one of the co-founders of Talent Maker City. For the past 23 years she has been involved in all aspects of education in Southern Oregon; working with middle school, high school, and college aged youth. Her experiences have molded her beliefs in equity, diversity, cultural agility and developing meaningful community partnerships. Currently, Alli is the Interim Director for Talent Maker City where she coordinates workshops and programs for curious minds of all ages. TMC’s STEAM Programming has served over 1500 students and hundreds of adults since its inception in 2016.

Experiencing YouScience in the Classroom: a game changer in career connected learning!
“Building upon a previous session covering the HOW of YouScience, this session will feature a moderated panel of educators who are using the platform with their students. YouScience uses scientifically proven, unbiased and objective “brain games” to uncover how each student’s brain processes information to discover what they would “naturally” be good at, so they can make informed decisions when it comes to exploring or choosing careers.
To date, SOESD’s CTE/CCL teams have helped to enroll 34 southern Oregon regional schools in YouScience, and so far, a whopping 2,460 students have completed their brain games, and gotten their results. That is very close to TWO-AND-A-HALF-THOUSAND STUDENTS with expanded self-awareness, confidence, hope, who now have a signpost for further career connected exploration! We will feature educators from some of our schools who have used YouScience to help students be empowered, equipped, and engaged.”
Amy Lukens Career Connected Learning Facilitator SOESD
Amy Lukens, MA, is excited about helping educators, and students, use YouScience to get to that next level in career advising and exploration. Amy has a rich and varied background in education, workforce development, accounting, grantsmanship, and geography. She is inspired by seeing the “aha” on students’ faces – reviewing their YS results – when they realize “I have something to offer, I’m naturally good at something!”

Virtual Field Trips That Are Out of This World
During this session, we will look at four different types of virtual field trips that provide rich learning experiences for students. We will compare the learning opportunities presented by live webcam virtual field trips, Google Earth Tours, 360 videos and walk through navigation virtual field trips. We will spend time creating meaningful learning activities and digital scavenger hunts that get students exploring the world around them in a virtual space. During our work together we will look at how to integrate virtual field trips into different content areas and the cross curricular learning opportunities available when facilitating a virtual field trip experience. We will also look at housing virtual field trip experiences on a google site or LMS that students can access independently to promote curiosity, choice and agency. And finally we will discuss the opportunities provided by community forms such as Padlet where students have the opportunity to share their experiences on virtual field trips.
Becky Van Duker Teacher Medford School District
Becky is currently a Classroom Teacher with experience as an Instructional Specialist in the Medford School District. She is passionate about engaging students in hands-on, inquiry based learning, putting together cross-curricular classroom transformations, and utilizing technology in ways that encourage creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. She is eager to collaborate with teachers on strategies to support all students as they find success and develop a passion for learning.

Easy Engineering Integration in the Elementary Classroom
In this workshop, the presenters will lead attendees through a hands-on engineering lesson (appropriate for elementary grades) and model how to seamlessly integrate engineering into multiple subject areas such as English Language Arts, Math, the Sciences, Technology, and Art. In groups, attendees will engage in the Engineering Design Process (EDP) to create a wind-powered car prototype. Throughout this hands-on learning experience, the presenters will give suggestions on best practices related to: facilitating the EDP in grades PreK-6, STEM integration, collecting STEM resources for the classroom, and hands-on learning. At the end of the session, attendees will race their cars and reflect on the impact that engaging, hands-on engineering lessons have on student motivation and learning outcomes.
Amanda Casto Assistant Professor of Education Southern Oregon University
Amanda teaches STEM education courses at Southern Oregon University. She is passionate about increasing student access to high-quality STEM education and supporting teachers to make all lessons more multicultural, integrative, & hands-on.

Think Outside the Box with Talent Maker City (Continued from Session 3)
Think Outside the Box with Talent Maker City! Come learn all about Talent Maker City and how we utilize hands-on learning to engage students in making. We’ll explore some affordable and easy to implement programming as well as some of our higher tech projects. We’ll share a little bit about TMC and give you an opportunity to participate as a learner! This session is for both Elementary and Middle School educators.
Alli French Executive Director Talent Maker City
Alli is a long-time educator and maker – and one of the co-founders of Talent Maker City. For the past 23 years she has been involved in all aspects of education in Southern Oregon; working with middle school, high school, and college aged youth. Her experiences have molded her beliefs in equity, diversity, cultural agility and developing meaningful community partnerships. Currently, Alli is the Interim Director for Talent Maker City where she coordinates workshops and programs for curious minds of all ages. TMC’s STEAM Programming has served over 1500 students and hundreds of adults since its inception in 2016.