With Helpful Feedback from Participants, Our First Virtual Learning Sessions for KLN and PCN Were a Great Success

By Dakota Punzel
Program Coordinator
Alabama Best Practices Center

The Alabama Best Practices Center has just wrapped up our first round of Key Leaders Network and Powerful Conversations Network professional learning events for this school year!

In partnership with our in-service center partners and school leaders throughout the state, we’ve worked diligently to deliver – in a virtual environment – the same dynamic learning and networking our participating school and district members have come to expect.

We certainly understand how busy educators are throughout the state and have done everything possible to make this a smooth and flexible experience worthy of their scarce time and attention.

During the weeks of September and October, we hosted six live Key Leaders Network sessions and 11 live sessions for the Powerful Conversations Network. Educators responded and adapted to our all-virtual format so well that these sessions were attended by over 600 educators from nearly 40 districts.

After each session we asked for “critical friend feedback.” Thanks to the candid comments of participants, we quickly learned how we could better engage our members, create more dynamic breakout sessions, and improve our networking as a whole.

In addition to helpful guidance, we’ve received some insightful comments each week about how much educators valued their live-session time as an opportunity to “get back to normal.”

Here’s some of what we heard:

✻ “The breakout rooms were fantastic.”

✻ “It was really good. The modeling of the use of technology was fabulous.”

✻ “Everything about the breakout room was tremendous.”

✻ “I will tell you something that was comforting. The experience today was like the experience we would have had in a face-to-face session.”

It’s not too late to join the networks! For more information about our upcoming sessions, call or email me, Dakota Punzel, at [email protected] or 334-279-1886.