Sunday, August 01, 2004

"Econ Camp"

For those of you who have been briefed about my teaching situation next year, I have been drafted to teach a one semester Economics course for our seniors. Even though I was an Economics major in college, I really have no idea what I'll be doing. Therefore, for my second professional development conference of the summer I am attending a weeklong seminar run by the Foundation for Teaching Economics being held here on the campus of the University of Illinois-Chicago.

Here's how much my life is charmed:





My half-mile walk from the loft to the conference


Yes, Leah and Rich's loft is a mere one half mile walk from where the conference is being held. I could not have asked for a better location to be staying. Here's a part of my walk:





I cross over I-290, aka the Eisenhower Expressway. On the left side of the photo is my local "El" stop, UIC-Halsted. I also love that the two signs to the right point to Wisconsin (take the left to the Kennedy Expressway) or Indiana (take the right to the Dan Ryan Expressway). I don't why that tickles me, but it does.


I must, however, have one not so great thing and so here it is:





The 60's architecture of the campus






More uninspired architecture from UI-C


So the conference started this afternoon at 4PM. The format of the conference has college professors and a mentor high school teacher teaching economics to the students in the morning using hands-on activities and simulations. Then in the afternoon, we teachers get further training with the professors and mentor teacher. We actually had a lesson today, that being "opportunity cost". What did each conference attendee give up to be here this week?





My binder of knowledge


I'm psyched for this conference. One note, this is the organization that I used to work for, but now I'm actually a participant. It was nice to reconnect with old friends that I used to work with, Linwood P. and Smokey M.. You'll be seeing photos of them in blog posts to come.

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