PUTNAM COUNTY – The Putnam County School System’s Future Ready VITAL 2022 Google Summit took place over the weekend, welcoming over 400 educators from all over the southeastern United States.
“It was our first summit in person since COVID,” said Sam Brooks, Future Ready VITAL Supervisor for Putnam County schools. “It was great to welcome back new and familiar faces in person. The energy was high as the summit gave attendees a behind-the-scenes look at how schools across Tennessee are transforming their approach to teaching and learning with the goal of personalized student learning.”
The summit is free for educators, which is the mission the Future Ready team wants to continue in the years ahead.
“It is extremely important that the summit is free for all educators,” said Brooks. “This takes strategic vendor buy-in to support the event, so it remains free to educators. The school system is incredibly grateful to our major sponsor Bluum for believing in this summit and being a long-time supporter. We have welcomed new co-sponsors this year and welcomed back many long supporting co-sponsor to help our mission live on.”
Attendees walked into Prescott South’s campus for a time of networking and learning as they joined in on various breakout sessions to grow as educators and learn new ways to incorporate technology tools in their classrooms and schools.
A few of the session topics available for attendees at the Google Summit were:
- Understanding how to utilize Google suite in the classroom
- How to rebuild relationships with teammates impacted by the pandemic
- Aligning school teams
- Understanding data easier
- Tools to use to engage students in the classroom
- Incorporating Industry Certifications (IC) into Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs
- Integrating STEM into the classroom
- Cybersecurity
“We plan for the summit a year in advance, thinking of new ways to engage educators with a variety of topics that are useful and can immediately be used in their classroom,” said Brooks.
“This summit would not be possible without the work of the Future Ready VITAL team including Brenda Choate, Lance Key, Shannon Pirtle, Jackie Vester and Adam West. This team is bought into helping educators grow and explore new possibilities. I am lucky to work alongside them. Many VITAL teachers also put in a lot of time preparing Prescott South Middle School for the event on Friday and welcoming the attendees on Saturday and we are very appreciative of their time and effort. We look forward to next year’s summit and welcoming more educators from across the Southeast to Cookeville to engage, inspire, create, innovate and achieve.”
The summit’s title sponsor was BLUUM. The event’s co-sponsors were eDynamic Learning, Accelerate Learning, IXL, Class, ViewSonic, iCEV, Imagine Learning, Tennessee College of Applied Technology, Tennessee Tech University, Schoolytic, Samsung, Discovery Education, Education Elements, Shmoop, WeVideo and Philips.
