2009 Texas Institute

Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence had a wonderful at the National Institute at the Gaylord Texan Resort in Grapevine, Texas last week! We had an attendance of more than 150 people from all over the United States and even Canada!

Dr. Phil Schlechty helped to kick off the conference as our Tuesday keynote speaker with an excellent lecture on educational reform. Dr. Schechty is the founder and CEO of the Center for Leadership in School Reform and author of "Inventing Better Schools: An Action Plan for Educational Reform," "Schools for the 21st Century: Leadership Imperative for Educational Reform," as well as many others.

Our keynote speaker at Wednesday's luncheon was Debbie Phelps. Ms. Phelps is not only an author, motivational speaker and principal of a STEM school, but she is also the mother of 8-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps. She spoke about her school and the relationships educators should have with their students, as well as about her Olympian son.

Our student ambassadors Tuesday were Ben Heath from Grapevine High School and Graham McMillan from Colleyville High School, both from Texas's Grapevine-Colleyville Independent School District. Wednesday's student ambassadors were Teresa Gully and Andrew Kreis, both swim team captains from Bishop Dunne Catholic School in Dallas, Texas. All of the ambassadors did an excellent job emceeing the events and announcing the winners of our door prizes. The Red Jackets of Colleyville Heritage High School and the Leadership Class of Grapevine High School also did an excellent job serving as guides and helping with registration and directions.

Institute participants attended a variety of concurrent sessions Tuesday and Wednesday ranging from educational best practices and programs to technology, including Thinking Maps and SMART Technology. Students from Bishop Dunne Catholic School participated in the World Peace Project, where they created the Texas 10 along with student ambassadors Ben Heath and Graham McMillan. Together, these young people will create World Utopia, an online social network to promote cross-cultural cooperation among students to work toward world peace.

Wednesday morning, participants had the opportunity to visit local schools. Four exemplary schools hosted our participants: DeLay Middle School (Lewisville ISD), Heritage Elementary School (Grapevine-Colleyville ISD), New Tech High School (Coppell ISD) and Samuel Beck Elementary School (Northwest ISD).

We all had a wonderful time at the conference and look forward to the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence National Conference Dec. 8-12 at Walt Disney World ® in Florida!

Be sure to check out our photos from the event!