A once-in-a-lifetime travel experience to China for Clarke Community Schools Superintendent Steve Seid is doubling as an opportunity to promote the district to a community of global educators.
Seid and his wife, Carol, associate superintendent of human resources for West Des Moines School District, have both been invited to speak about global literacy at the second-annual Conference of Global K-12 Education Research Association beginning Thursday.
“Clarke Schools has concentrated on strengthening student literacy for a long time,” Seid said. “Now, with the district’s full integration of technology that makes global communication skills so vital, we have the great opportunity to share our successes and learn from educators from around the world so we can truly ready our students for the future.”
The conference theme is “Cultivation of students as literate citizens in a global context,” with the focus on building student literacy and comprehension skills for the 21st century and beyond. Seid is presenting on Clarke’s commitment to district literacy and learning initiatives.
Not only is the trip a unique opportunity for Seid to experience the Chinese culture and collaborate with other educators from around the globe, but it also comes at no cost to the school district.
“What a great opportunity to learn from educators from every corner of the globe and have the chance to boast about what we are doing at Clarke Community Schools,” Seid said.
Travel logistics
The conference will be held in Shijiazhuang, China, about 160 miles southwest of Beijing, at the Shijiazhuang Foreign Language School. Seid said it is a private school with 1,000 students in each grade. They emphasize learning multiple languages and including the arts in the curriculum.
After being approved to attend the conference and then selected to present, Seid had to start the meticulous process of preparing the required documents for international travel to China.
“The school where this conference is being held provided a letter of invitation to go along with our visa,” Seid said. “The ink from the school’s stamp was not dark enough, so we had to request a new letter.”
The entire process to submit the visa and letter of invitation took more than a year to complete. The visa includes an itinerary that details where Seid plans to be for the entire duration of the trip.
All of the paperwork had to be submitted to a Chinese embassy. The closest Chinese embassy to Osceola is in Chicago.
“I think we take for granted our freedom to be able to travel,” Seid said.
Global learning experience
Educators from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Italy, and Japan will converge on Shijiazhuang to share ideas and discuss the challenges and solutions for strengthening literacy levels in schools across the globe.
“Each attendee is assigned a translator to help with some of the logistics of the day-to-day process,” Seid said.
The translators also serve as a liaison to facilitate networking opportunities so the educators can share and discuss ideas after formal presentations.
He added that each individual gets an ear piece that translates what each presenter is saying in real time. Each seminar also has a booklet that contains the biography and some content from the presenters which is also translated for every individual.
After his trip, Seid plans to work with the school board, administration team and staff to try to incorporate what he learns at the conference to help improve the school district.
“I think it’s a wonderful opportunity for him and also as it relates to the school to see how other educational systems work,” said Shane Stephens, Clarke Community High School Principal. “I think it will help (Seid) understand and get some feedback from international education leaders as to how other systems operate. As always, he will present it to the entire staff and ask what we think about it, we mull it over and we together decide – if there is anything to implement.”
Seid already plans to present to social studies classes about his experience.
“I saw it as a great opportunity, and I don’t pass up on opportunities to talk about the great things we do in this school district,” Seid said.