BY VAISHALI TOURANI
Staff Writer

While many education conferences feature presentations from teachers and principals, EdCamp PGH, hosted at the high school, also gave students a chance to lead.
Seniors Sara Roberto, Zack Peal, Josh Zinmiester, Ryan Elias, and Nick O’Toole all participated in a presentation on the spread of school spirit.
“It was really cool,” Roberto said. “We got to voice our opinions on things we don’t agree with without getting reprimanded. I would participate in it again.”
Another presentation at the conference dealt with how to create an active learning ecosystem, presented by Dr. Lisa Abel-Palmieri, director of technology and innovation at the Ellis School. Focusing on how to make use of learning space, Palmieri introduced ideas about how fellow educators can change aspects of a classroom to impact students’ learning.
“The active learning ecosystem is about shifting from a passive to active pedagogical approach to help students hypothesize,” Abel-Palmieri said.
At the end of the presentation, the audience suggested ideas for a “dream classroom.” Some changes included adding crafting materials to a classroom, unblocking websites, and promoting movement among students.
Another presentation, provocatively titled, “Isn’t it Great to be White?,” presented by math teacher Justin Aion, discussed how to introduce social awareness into classrooms — even classes that do not normally include current events.
Aion argued that whites need to be aware of the privilege they have in society and of the unfair treatment of people of color.
Aion encouraged educators to make their classrooms a safe place to facilitate the topic of social justice.
“We need to acknowledge that students all come from different backgrounds,” Aion said. “We need to creat and make a safe environment to make these discussions possible because social justice is important and pervasive in all topics.”
English teacher Dr. Daniel Harrold, one of the organizers of the Ed Camp, gave a presentation on gamification. He praised the flexibility of the Ed Camp, which bills itself as an “un-conference.”
“Ed Camp excels because of its accessibility. It’s modified based on the amount of people who attend and what they want to listen to,” Harrold said.
Another organizer of the event, technology director Dr. Janeen Peretin, describes the sessions in the conference as being led by the law of two feet. A person can go into a presentation, then decide to go to another all in the same hour.
“It’s different. It puts ownership on the educators and not someone dictating the whole thing,” Peretin said.