Inaugural Meeting
November 11, 2012 -- 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM -- Occidental College
Event Summary :
The goals of this meeting were: 1) To announce the formation of the Greater Southern California Arabic Language Teacher’s Council, 2) to solicit teacher opinions about when, where, what, and how many times to meet during the year, and 3) to discuss how to nominate and vote for members of the Executive Committee.
Invitations were sent to Arabic teachers, administrators, public and private schools, weekend schools, universities, board members, and institutions responsible for teacher training. 40 participants attended.
An overview was provided of the goals of the TC including QFI's role in financing the program. Al-Hadi and the National Arabic Teacher's Association were given the chance to talk about the connection to another QFI funded projects and about NATA’s newsletter.
Attendees worked in groups where they shared both successful strategies and challenges they face teaching Arabic. They also responded to a questionnaire regarding days and times most convenient to meet, the frequency for meetings, and rated various options for meeting agendas.
Each group provided a summary of what they talked about highlighting group preferences. We encouraged participants to become members and provided directions on how to join. We asked participants to help recruit more teachers and administrators, and to nominate representatives for the Executive Committee.
We raffled tickets for Arabic language teaching materials. Lunch was provided in the college cafeteria and participants continued networking and sharing of ideas.