Mark your calendar for the Indiana Non-Public Administrators’ Conference (INPAC) scheduled for September 22-23, 2022 at the Renaissance Indianapolis North Hotel. INPAC is the only conference for non-public school educators in Indiana!
Find more information and register here.
Kim Bearden – Fight Song: 6 Steps to Passion, Power, Peace, and Purpose
Kim Bearden is the cofounder, executive director, and language arts teacher at the highly acclaimed Ron Clark Academy, an innovative middle school and educator-training facility in Atlanta. Over 85,000 educators from around the world have visited Kim’s classroom and have attended her workshops to learn better ways to engage students, build relationships, foster academic excellence, enhance communication, and create a climate and culture for success.
In 2016, Kim was honored at the White House for being inducted into the National Teachers Hall of Fame. She was selected from over 70,000 nominations to be honored as the Disney American Teacher Awards Outstanding Humanities Teacher, and the Milken Family Foundation selected her to receive the Award for Excellence in Education. She is the winner of the Influencer Award, the University of Georgia Outstanding Educator Award, and the Turknett Character Award for Servant Leadership. Over the past thirty-four years, Kim has been a teacher, instructional lead teacher, curriculum director, school-board member, staff-development trainer, and middle-school principal. Kim is a bestselling author of three books: Crash Course: The Life Lessons My Students Taught Me; Talk to Me: Find the Right Words to Inspire, Encourage, and Get Things Done; and her newest book, Fight Song: Six Steps to Passion, Power, Peace, and Purpose. We are excited to have Kim as our Thursday afternoon keynote speaker!
Virginia Walden Ford
Virginia Walden Ford is one of America’s leading advocates for parent empowerment. Her father was a principal and the first black assistant superintendent of the Little Rock school district. Her mother was one of the first black teachers to work at an all-white elementary school there. Virginia and her twin sister were among a group of about 130 black students who were handpicked to desegregate Little Rock’s high schools in the mid-1960s.Virginia has served as Community Outreach Director/Media Specialist for Friends of Choice in Urban Schools (FOCUS), as a volunteer with the Center for Education Reform in their 1997 parent outreach campaign, and as a Parent Outreach Coordinator with the National Center for Neighborhood Enterprise in their 1998 effort to organize parents to support school choice and the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Act. She is a national board member and a founding member of the Black Alliance for Educational Options and is president of the organization’s Washington, D.C. chapter. Virginia also serves as a board member of the Booker T. Washington Public Charter School and as Executive Director of D.C. Parents for School Choice, Inc, a clearinghouse designed to organize and educate parents to empower them to make appropriate educational decisions for their children.
Virginia was the recipient of the Heritage Foundation’s prestigious 2004 Salvatori Prize for American Citizenship, the Black Alliance for Educational Options’ 2004 Vision Award, and the 2005 Leonard F. DeFiore Parental Choice Advocate Award from the National Catholic Education Association. She is the author of “Voices, Choices, and Second Chances: How to Win the Battle to Bring Opportunity Scholarships to Your State” and “School Choice: A Legacy to Keep.” She is also the subject of the 2019 film “Miss Virginia.” We are excited to have Virginia as our Thursday dinner keynote speaker!
Ted Neitzke – You Matter
Ten minutes with Ted, and you will be energized by his optimism and passion for leadership. You will also have an understanding of why the people who know him best say that he is “contagiously energetic, insanely curious, service orientated, and passionate about the young people of our world.”
Ted is a motivational keynote speaker who has presented to thousands of educators around the country. He demonstrates the power every individual carries to influence other people through optimism and cognizant leadership. Ted has been a teacher, principal, and superintendent. Ted is also the host and creator of “The Smart Thinking Podcast,” which is dedicated to supporting leadership in the classroom, the boardroom, and in life by sparking reflection, action, collaboration, and empathy. He currently serves as the CEO of CESA 6, a non-profit, member-driven cooperative educational service agency in Wisconsin. We are excited to have Ted as our Friday morning keynote!