The National School Choice Resource Center

presents the

National Conference on

                   IMPROVING STUDENT OPPORTUNITIES WITH                        SYSTEMIC SCHOOL CHOICE

^{{March 30, 2012 at the Holiday Inn Capitol in Washington D.C.}} 

The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Innovation and Improvement and its technical assistance providers, The Federal Leadership Institute, the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy (CEEP) at Indiana University and the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CPRE) at the University of Washington, are planning a dynamic conference on school choice.Over the last thirty years, the United States has experienced fundamental changes in its public school systems. Students today often have a range of options for schools and learning, options many parents could not imagine just a couple decades earlier. Students can avail themselves of school vouchers, magnet schools, charter schools, and intra- and inter-district choice options.  Research increasingly shows that school choice is not only well received by families but producing academic success.

Today districts, ranging from those as large as New York City and as small as Central Falls, Rhode Island with its six schools, are integrating charter, traditional district, and magnet schools into coherent choice systems that provides better educational opportunities for all students.

Join us and national school choice leaders and experts at the National Conference on Improving Student Opportunities and Success with Systemic Choice to learn more about these districts and how to leverage choice to provide your students with a richer and higher quality experience.

Attendees at this day-long conference will hear from and meet leaders in districts currently implementing systemic choice initiatives.  Attendees will also participate in discussions that explore some of the most pressing challenges district and school leaders face in creating and implementing these choice systems. 

Plenary sessions, featuring national leaders including James Shelton, Paul Hill, Marc Stein, Julie Mead, and Suzanne Eckes will introduce attendees to the thinking behind systemic choice, the latest research on school choice, and legal issues surrounding the implementation and expansion of choice.  Break out sessions will provide attendees the opportunity to interact with each other and experts on how to build the funding, enrollment, and accountability systems needed to support choice as well as strategies for engaging parents in choice decisions, building transportation networks that serve all students, and building pipelines of talent for diverse schools. 

This conference is the perfect opportunity for:

• District leaders and school board members in districts with charter schools, magnet schools, or intra-district choice looking for ideas in how to coordinate these programs for greater impact.
• Charter school and magnet school leaders seeking ways to forge more productive relationships with their local districts.
• District or state leaders newly implementing systemic choice to build the knowledge base of the central administrators, principals, and board members who will be integral in meeting the challenges of systemic choice reforms.