CoSN CTO Clinic

	About CoSN Chapters CTO Clinics Texas, June 2006 Colorado, January 2007

Speakers

Speakers Subject to Change

Jon Bernstein
President, Bernstein Strategy Group

Mr. Bernstein has been working on education, education technology and telecommunications issues since 1995. Currently, Mr. Bernstein advises and represents the Consortium for School Networking and the International Society for Technology in Education on issues related to the E-Rate program, education technology and federal education appropriations. He also counsels established corporations, such as IBM, Intel and Cox Communications on a wide-range of public policy issues. Prior to launching the Bernstein Strategy Group, Mr. Bernstein served as Vice President at Leslie Harris & Associates, where he worked with all of his current clients and the National Education Association, the State Educational Technology Directors Association, Time Warner, Verizon and WGBH in Boston. Before assuming his position at Leslie Harris & Associates, Mr. Bernstein served as an Attorney Advisor with the Federal Communications Commission, lobbied for the National Education Association, served as legislative counsel for The Lightspan Partnership and worked as a Legal Fellow for Senator Dianne Feinstein.

C. Jackson Grayson, Jr., PhD
Chairman, American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC)

Dr. Grayson has a bachelor's degree from Tulane University, an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, and a doctorate in business from the Harvard Business School. His academic career has included professorships at Harvard, Stanford, Tulane, and SMU, and he has taught in business schools in France and Switzerland. He has also been a Dean of two business schools -- at Tulane University and at SMU -- where he became known for instituting innovations in business education.

Dr. Grayson became most widely known in 1971, when he was appointed during the period of price-wage controls to serve as Chairman of the United States Price Commission, under President Richard Nixon. Though few liked controls, Dr. Grayson was accorded national recognition by the press, businessmen, and labor for his fair and firm administration of the controls and for his work in helping remove them.

During his experience with controls, Dr. Grayson became aware of how important productivity was to the economic well-being of the nation, how American productivity growth had begun to slow, and the rising competition from abroad. He was one of the first people in the nation to sound the alarm about our sagging productivity and competitiveness. After he left Washington, Dr. Grayson returned to the private sector and founded the non-profit APQC (American Productivity & Quality Center in Houston, Texas to alert the nation to the danger and to work on improving American competitiveness.

In 1990, Business Week said of Grayson, “Few, if any, individual Americans have done more during the last 20 years to shape the country’s economic future for the better.” The story behind that statement is the history of APQC—the American Productivity & Quality Center.

For the almost 30 years, APQC has been working with business, healthcare, and government to help these sectors re-structure and improve. APQC has about 80 employees, and works with leading organizations not only in the U.S.A. but also in other nations. It does research, training, provides information services and technical assistance, and creates publications, in areas such as productivity, quality, benchmarking, measurement, employee involvement, knowledge management, process management, technical assistance, and others.

APQC was the first in the nation to lead an effort to create a national quality award, which is now the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award, and APQC co-administered the Award with the American Society for Quality for its first three years. They also created the “APQC International Benchmarking Clearinghouse,” which now has about 350 leading U.S. and international organizations exchanging knowledge and best practices for improvement.

In 1997, APQC launched an effort to help the education sector to restructure and improve student achievement and system performance, drawing on the methodologies and lessons learned over its 27 year existence. It has projects underway with schools, districts, states, and the federal government.

Dr. Grayson is a CPA and has been a member of the Board of Directors of eight major U.S. corporations. He was named in 2000 by Teleos, an English research firm, as one of the 10 “Most Admired Knowledge Leaders” in North America. In November 2003, he was named by the American Society of Quality (ASQ), as one of nine “Distinguished Service Medalists."

Dr. Grayson's career, however, is not confined to just business. He believes in variety, constant learning, experimentation, and fun. His career has included being a newspaper reporter in New Orleans, a Special Agent of the FBI, a manager of a cotton farm in North Louisiana, a member of an export-import firm. He is also a single-engine airplane pilot, has gone sky-diving, has owned race horses, and has visited all seven world continents, including a recent trip to Antarctica, and around the world. He obviously believes in Self Renewal, a book by John Gardner that he says he reads regularly.

He is an author of about 50 articles in magazines and newspapers and also is the author of four books, the latest being with Carla O'Dell, entitled “If Only We Knew What We Know”, a book about knowledge management and internal transfer of best practices.

Rich Kaestner
Project Director, Total Cost of Ownership and Value of Investment, CoSN

Rich Kaestner serves as TCO Project Director for the Consortium for School Networking. In that capacity, Rich coordinated the development of the web-based CoSN-Gartner K-12 TCO tool, and continues to provide project leadership, training and technical support for this initiative, which is now exploring the Value of Investment (VOI) for K-12 technology projects. Prior to his work with CoSN, Rich was a technology marketplace consultant with Gartner and worked in various management, sales and support capacities for technology vendors.

Keith Krueger, CAE
CEO, CoSN

Mr. Krueger is CEO of the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), a national nonprofit that promotes the use of information technologies and the Internet in K-12 classrooms to improve learning. He has a Masters of Arts in Public Affairs from the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota. He serves on the Advisory Board for The New York Times Learning Network, onCourse, eSchool News, Riverdeep and Scholastic Administr@tor Magazine. He is a representative for the National Science Foundation on a joint EU/US committee planning a joint research agenda for eLearning. He is a past Board Member for the Organizations Concerned about Rural Education (OCRE) and the National Committee on Technology in Education & Training (NCTET). He has been honored as an eSchool News IMPACT 30 key U.S. leader in educational technology.

Alan November
Senior Partner, November Learning

Alan is a whirlwind of big ideas and provocative questions. He thrives on confirming and challenging educators’ thoughts about what’s possible in the world of teaching and learning. More than anything, he is a teacher at heart, with a wealth of experience teaching students at all levels. He began his career as an oceanography teacher and dorm counselor at an island reform school for boys in Boston Harbor. He has since been a director of an alternative high school, computer coordinator, technology consultant, and university lecturer. As practitioner, designer, and author, Alan has guided schools, government organizations and industry leaders as they plan to improve quality with technology. When not traversing the globe at breakneck speed, Alan enjoys kayaking, building rock walls and gardening in Marblehead. He’s a great fisherman and will always have a story or two to share with you about the one that got away...

Linda Sharp
Project Director, Cyber Security for the Digital District, CoSN

Linda Sharp is an education and learning professional with over 30 years experience. She is currently Project Manager for CoSN’s Cyber Security and Accessible Technology for All Students Initiatives. Prior to her work with CoSN, Linda worked with AlphaSmart, Inc as Vice President of Professional Services and Vice President of Sales. Linda also worked with Educational Resources as Director of Staff Development and Western Regional Sales Manager. Prior to her work in the education industry, Linda was a teacher, coach and District Technology Advisor for Cherry Creek Schools in Englewood, CO where she provided leadership and coordination for schools in the area of technology integration, long range planning and staff development. Linda has a BA in Education from University of Northern Colorado, Greeley, CO and a MA in Education Technology from Lesley College, Boston, MA.