Gainesville school officials participating in dropout prevention meeting

GAINESVILLE - The 25th Annual National Dropout Prevention Network Conference will be held starting Sunday at the Crowne Plaza Ravinia in Atlanta.

The four-day session is designed to provide a professional learning opportunity for school board members, superintendents, counselors, administrators, educators, and other youth practitioners. The theme this year is "Pathways to Promise."

Special conference activities will focus on school board members. Keynote speakers include Bill Bennett, former U.S. Secretary of Education, who will lead a special session with school board members; Bill Milliken, Founder and Vice-Chair of Communities in Schools; and Karen Pittman, Founder and CEO of Forum for Youth Investment.

Members of the Gainesville Board of Education will participate in the conference.

Gainesville City Schools will also present in a session on the Unified System of Learning Supports to Address Barriers to Learning, the strategic planning and action framework based on the work of Dr. Howard Adelman and Dr. Linda Taylor from UCLA. The concept has received national attention in recent months. (See link below.)