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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 5, 1999

News Release

NEA Virtual Conference for New Teachers Helps Beginners Stay Afloat

Online Sessions in Discipline, Parent-Teacher Relations Featured

Washington, D.C. -- How do you inspire a child who comes to school hungry? How do you keep one child from disrupting an entire classroom? And how do you connect with parents who work full time or speak little English? These are some of the dilemmas that a beginning teacher must overcome. To help prepare new teachers for the realities of today's classrooms, the National Education Association will sponsor its first-ever Beginning Teacher Virtual Conference, October 9-23, 1999.

This free conference will provide new teachers with an online forum to share and learn from fellow novices and experienced veterans nationwide. Successful strategies in classroom management and parent-teacher conferencing will be shared through online resource rooms. Participants will also exchange tips on building critical awareness skills and strengthening the student-teacher relationship.

Special encouragement will come from virtual keynote speaker Esme Raji Codell, the nationally acclaimed author of the just-published journal, Educating Esme: Diary of a Teacher's First Year. Codell's insightful book gives a candid look at a first-year teacher's experience in an inner-city Chicago public school and documents her roller-coaster ride with students, administrators and colleagues.

All conference discussions will be posted on Web-based message boards for easy and convenient access. To participate, go to www.nea.org/btvc and complete the registration form. Once you are registered, you may sign on at any time between Oct. 9-23 to monitor the discussions.

The virtual conference is one of many services that will be provided to beginners this school year through NEA's new teacher initiative, "Helping New Teachers Succeed." The Association-wide effort provides mentors for first and second-year teachers. The program also promotes less challenging classes and fewer extracurricular activities for new hires to allow them time to observe and learn from more seasoned peers. A CD-ROM and other products that address the professional needs of beginning teachers are also in development.

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The National Education Association is the nation’s largest professional employee organization, representing more than 2.7 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support personnel, school administrators, retired educators, and students preparing to become teachers.