14/5/13 – Boston and Burlington HS

 

Today I took a cab (as there was no public transport available – of course the kids all get picked up in the big yellow school buses so they don’t need public transport … but what about visitors like me?) to visit the Apple award winning high school at Burlington. Burlington consists of one HS, one Junior HS and three feeder elementary schools. I was fortunate to meet up with Dennis Villano (District Head of Technology), Andy Marcinek (Technology Education Support), Patrick Larkin (Assistant Superintendent and HS Principal).

Dennis explained to me that the population of Burlington swells by about 16,000 people a day who work in the ICT industry (and who apparently must all drive their cars to work each day). So this high tech community is super positive and very supportive about the use of technology to facilitate learning.

You may not be aware but each county has a public vote on each local budget and education is one of the items very well supported in this area the school currently has iPads in Year 1 and Middle School and next year go one to one throughout the school. 

They have a student run ‘Help Desk’ where senior students who are doing a technology subject assist staff issues during class time as part of their community service in their spares. They also write programs eg podcasts to explain to staff and student show to use the various devices, programs and apps. They have become so effective a model, the students I spoke to are invited to present their innovative practice at conferences.

Interestingly their Web site is a lot more open to the public and staff blogs are public. Check out the

www.burlington.org/departments/schools/burlington_high_school website and under the ‘find your school’ tab have a look at Pine Glen Elementary School. Their Yr 1s recently rated their favourite apps in a movie and have just started their learning journals that will go with them through to Yr12!

The staff also has an ‘EdCamp’ where staff choose to turn up and then random staff contribute their best practice for conference. Our website could do with showcasing some work instead of being a place where parents go to see if they want to send their son to WC. They are really keen to work collaboratively with us and our students. No surprise they are an Apple School and doing great things.

Meanwhile, Peter had very nicely taken it upon himself to act as the ‘advance scout’ for my trip to Harvard tomorrow. He worked out what subway trains I need to catch and how long the trip would take by actually doing it himself. Then he visited the Graduate School of Education to confirm the venue I need to report to tomorrow. And he bought me a pre-paid ‘Charlie card’ so I could ride the subway and the bus system with ease. What a great husband!

Eventually, after I got back from Burlington and Peter got back from Harvard, we met up back at the hostel and decided to head up to the North End for dinner. We wound up on Hannover Street in the heart of Boston’s “Little Italy” and had a delightful dinner at a window seat in an authentic Italian trattoria. After dinner we strolled around the streets for an hour or so just soaking in the sights and the atmosphere.

We saw JFK’s favourite restaurant ‘The Union Oyster House’ (on Union Street, naturally), the City Hall (easily Boston’s ugliest public or private building), the Holocaust Memorial and the famous ‘steaming tea pot’ (ironically now situated above a Starbucks coffee shop) in Tremont Street.  Got home early and went straight to bed as I have busy few days ahead at Harvard where I’m doing a short course on ‘Global Education’.