“We know all the participants benefited from your perspective on culture, language, and culturally & linguistically responsive instructional strategies. We had almost 450 people registered and 175 people listening in.  Also, over 96% of the survey participants who have responded so far said that the experience was very helpful to them.  A few of the comments elaborating on this question were that the webinar “was very useful for promoting the notion that all students are capable of high levels of achievement, but must be provided with instruction that is aligned to their needs” and that it “truly validated, affirmed, built and bridged my knowledge base…I will use this experience in my professional development workshops. Thank you!”

 

“I attended your panel session at this week's IRA and came away feeling energizes, inspired, and validated.  I am emailing to extend my appreciation for the work you do.”

“Thank you so much for coming to NC last week.  Our principals and teachers really enjoyed your presentation and found it very helpful.”

"I wasn't able to see your workshop on Friday, because I was at the Day 4 workshop, but my thoughts and prayers were with you all day.  I just wanted to say it was my dream for our whole district to be trained by you and it has happened!  I feel like it is monumental and I'm so happy our district made the commitment to do this.  I want to say that your message is life changing and I have heard already from a few people how beneficial Friday was.  I am still trying to get you on Oprah before she retires  becauseI feel you need a bigger venue for your message.  I hope that's okay with you.  Your work is so important and I hope you always have the strength and determination to continue!  Thanks for all your work with our school and children!"

 
"Once again I have been to another on e of your inspiring sessions and I am truly encouraged by the two young ladies that presented today, Amy and Jamila.  I am Geometry teacher at Hazelwood East and at one time or another have faced the disappointments of teaching to a students who I thought "just didn't get it".  That I was not speaking to them but at them and once we all learned to speak each others language they could do great things.  Now my success rate is 3 times higher that my co workers who have resisted your strategies, I never take work home and i even work during my plan to help other teacher with their "more difficult students." 

"Ms. Coventry, your instructional skill was inspiring.  After your demo, I presented 3 demo lessons in 3 different classroom regarding the PersonalThesaurus with the context clue sentences.  Two out of three teachers said that they would be integrating these strategies in some form into their classrooms.  I did my homework, I had blank vocab sheets on a power point for demo, and in addition, had the same power words as differentiation for low learners who struggle with the concept,as opposed to the vocabulary.  The activity itself was very well received by students overall, they struggled a little more with creating the personal thesaurus itself. Perhaps we can discuss that that is a fine point; it was successful overall."

"I wanted to share with you some of the data from San Leandro 
I know the work here was limited, but the results at the elementary level were outstanding.Thanks again for the support and speaking at our region leadership summit last April.  It is nice to see strategies that improve how kids feel at and about school translate to tangible data."

 
"It was a great experience for me to attend both presentations in Bremerton. This message is so important for our district and for understanding the impact culturally and linguistically responsive teaching has on kids. Thank you for the work you do and for taking the time to share your expertise with us."

http://www.journaltimes.com/articles/2009/08/10/local_news/doc4a7f8931370b8218746521.txt  

"I met you at the workshop in St. Louis.  I spoke to you about how my co-workers twisted your information.  I want you to know how much your workshop change my own thinking about about African American language.  I feel validated and I cannot wait to utilize the instructional strategies in my class."

"Thank you so much for the powerful, engaging, and comprehensively relevant PD workshops these last two days. What an incredible experience! Sharroky and Daniel: it was an honor to meet you and experience firsthand the ways in which you are making confident change agents of your students through culturally and linguistically relevant teaching. Thanks for being so open, accessible, willing, and giving of your immense knowledge and experience. We really appreciated how you were responsive to us, got down on our level, and moved through the sessions with such honest agility."

"Thanks for expanding my horizons as a teacher (and as a human frankly) at the recent CCRTL conference in Napa.  After the first 2 days, I submitted this proposal for 13 books from your K-2 library list and today I found out that it was funded.  I will have 13 beautiful new books to fill my shelves in the Fall.  Just thought you would be pleased to see your work continuing to spread."