Education forum series makes LV its starting point

The National Education Association chose Las Vegas to be the site of the first of a series of 19 nationwide public forums at which people from diverse backgrounds meet to discuss major issues facing education.

If Tuesday night's gathering at Cashman Field Center was a testing of the waters for future forums in other states, to some the water may have seemed a bit chilly.

Only 40 of 750 people who were invited to the session attended the vanguard event, but organizers refused to be dismayed by the low turnout.

When asked if he was disappointed that only 40 showed up, Kevin Nielsen, with the Clark County Classroom Teachers Association, replied "No. Forty people were here."

Several NEA executives from Washington, D.C., attended Tuesday's session to observe and take notes.

Sheila Simmons, former director for the NEA's Center for the Advancement of Public Education and now national coordinator of the public forum project, also expressed satisfaction with first of the meetings that are planned for the next several months.

"Forty is not disappointing," she said. "Whoever came, that is who was supposed to be here. These people will be our best ambassadors.

The Clark County Education Association and the Greenspun College of Urban Affairs co-sponsored the local event, which the NEA calls "Community Conversation."

The next forum is scheduled for Saturday in Hershey, Pa.

Nielsen said too many people are concerned with the outcome of events and he doesn't want people to look for a specific outcome from Tuesday's public forum or others that will be held in the future.

The important thing, he emphasized, is that people came together and discussed an important issue.

"The idea for the public forums came about because people are becoming disconnected from public education," Nielsen said.

"We're hoping to demonstrate that Americans do care about public education in their own communities," Simmons said.

She said Las Vegas was chosen to be the first demonstration site because educators here already are involved in reaching out to the community and trying to get the public involved.

"They were ahead of the others," she said. "They were ready and we wanted to go where there already were some existing efforts."

Simmons said the series is a two-year project that began in March with training sessions.

After the first year, more forum sites will be added, and after that she said it is hoped communities will continue to hold the events.

At Tuesday's forum in Las Vegas, participants divided into three groups and discussed the issue of the purpose of education for about two hours and then reconvened as one group to further discuss the issue.

"What we're doing is gathering community information," Nielsen said. "We will let the school board know what the community is thinking."

Simmons likened the forum to the beginning of a revolution.

"This is one way to bridge the gap between the community and public education," she said.

"We are on the forefront of a movement in the U.S. to get the public involved in discussions about their education," Nielsen said.

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