U.S. Department of Education Assistant Secretary Thelma Meléndez de Santa Ana will address the 2011 Western Regional School Improvement Grant Capacity-Building Conference for School Improvement Grant (SIG) recipients on Wednesday, April 6, at the Westin Los Angeles Airport Hotel in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles conference is the first of four regional, capacity-building conferences being held over the next two months to support state and local education agencies, as well as schools, in their efforts to successfully turnaround persistently low-performing schools. The conferences will bring together practitioners, researchers and education leaders from across the country to discuss challenges and share promising practices and examples.
The two-day conference, taking place April 5-6, is hosted by the U.S. Department of Education in partnership with its California, West, Southwest, Northwest and Pacific Comprehensive Centers and in part by WestEd, a nonprofit agency that manages the California and Southwest centers. During the conference, Dr. Meléndez de Santa Ana will underscore the importance of turning around low-performing schools, and how school turnarounds benefit students, families and the community. She will also discuss how the U.S. Department of Education is supporting states, districts and schools as they undertake this critical work.
Dates for upcoming conferences:
April 13-14 – Washington, D.C.
May 18-19 – Chicago, Ill.
May 24-25 – Denver, Colo.