The Conference That Changed Nothing

Spoiler Alert: It Was Not The Content

Issue #34: The Conference That Changed Nothing

SUMMER LEARNING

You send your assistant principal to a national leadership conference in late June. Three days, four hundred dollars in registration, airfare, hotel. She comes back with a tote bag and a stack of handouts. You ask her what she learned. She talks for two minutes. Then she says she’s glad she went. A month later, nothing has changed.

Professional learning for school leaders is a significant investment. The conference industry has built an entire economy around it. Some of it is genuinely valuable. A lot of it is not. And the difference rarely has to do with the speaker or the content.

The difference is what happens before and after the conference.

Before you send anyone, including yourself, to a professional learning event, have a specific conversation about the purpose. What are you going there to learn? What challenge in your building is this conference going to help you address? Write it down. A leader who goes to a conference…