Goals & Theme

GOAL & THEME OF THE CONFERENCE

PRIMARY GOAL: The primary goal of the CAID Conference 2009, to be held in Washington, D.C., is to bring educators together to share their wealth of knowledge in the area of educating deaf and hard of hearing students. Specific efforts are being made to make contact and invite teachers, who work with deaf students in the mainstream, who often feel somewhat isolated. (Please help us make contact with other teachers of deaf and hard of hearing students who might not be currently connected with CAID and forward proposal and conference information to them.)

THEME: The theme of the CAID Conference 2009 is "Educating Diverse Students:  Language, Culture and Learning".  The CAID Conference held in 2007 focused on the Millennials, a term coined to identify our current K-college student population; i.e., the first generation to develop with constant exposure to a digital world.

Deaf students who are entering postsecondary programs today have grown up with much greater access to each other and the world through internet access and digital communication technology.  The intent of CAID 2009 is to continue to explore how deaf and hard of hearing students may be different than previous generations due to their digitally-influenced developmental experiences, as well as individual variations in language, culture, and learning.

BENEFITS: Why should you attend?  CAID 2009 will provide you with the unique opportunity to network with teaching colleagues (K-college from diverse educational environments), educational interpreters, counselors, technical support professionals, and educational administrators.

It is guaranteed that participants will return home from the conference experience enlightened by new insights with respect to student diversity, motivated to try new teaching/learning strategies, and inspired by new friendships with fellow professionals who face similar challenges.   Following the conference, participants will have the ability to stay connected regularly through the new CAID communication network.