Steven A. Schapiro

Issues of what it means to be a man, masculinity, issues with his wife. Around race and gender and interconnected areas while he was doing his doctoral work. He now teaches in Fielding Graduate University with other middle-age men.

He is working on a model that cuts across various issues, such as Freire’s notion that people’s vocations is to become more fully human.

The slides were a bit difficult to read, as they has white text on a light background.

How can we connect personal limitations to larger issues.

Michael Kaufman, who wrote about finding a link between our power and our powerlessness. A reproduction of patriarchy is continued through this. If we can understand the pain through these issues,

An integrated model of an anti-sexist pedagogy for men

T group, Freire’s education for critical consciousness, and anti-oppressive education

Anti-oppressive is social justice education, which

Also used Kegan with defending, surrendering, and reintegrating - with holding environments needed to support those functions. 

This work is about phases and different learning environments from a course he developed and  teaches over a semester or through short-term intensives.

He causes disequilibrium first, rather than just tell people that they have to be fixed or have to change. After this experience and the freezing / unfreezing happens, he then works with support and action groups to help maintain the the changes and to prevent reverting once they get back to the initial settings.

National Association of Men against Oppression of Woman

There was a question about taking this model outside the classroom

All kinds of masculinities, and he looks at the intersection of gender and race and class. Homophobia and heterosexism. He spoke about homophobia as holding the glue of sexism together.

Breaking through and experiencing our own pain, then allows for the ability to then do something with this.

MY QUESTION -  can you clarify some of the assumptions you make about the men you work with?

• he never knows who he will get and what their issues may be when they begin. One assumption he makes is that all men are raised in a society that is sexist, and that is in the air we breathe and is everywhere. People do not want to be told they are bad and should be changed. It is important for people to get in touch with gender roles and how they keep them from the relationships they want and how those toles are linked to structures of sexism.

Another question was about how he does not undertsnad what he would learn in the course and to be more the life of the person he wants to be when he is done. How or what would be learned? Have to give people the tools for how to change.

SOmebody asked if he uses appreciative inquiry in this issue. Once people think about what it means to be a man and some positive experiences of this, then that is part of the creatring part to be a model or vision.

Thoughts include:

1. Blog project - need to clarify the methodology
2. GLBT and gender issues in HRD within the AHRD Proceddings and Journals (from the work of how feminism is within HRD literature).

Ursula T. Wright  Tonette S. Rocco

Ursula was the principle author of the paper, and she is not here since her vacation was canceled.

Dorothy Smith started the work with institutional ethnography. Tonette will speak about Ursula’s work with institutional ethnography. Derrick Well - Faces at the Bottom of the Well. She talked about Derrick Bell, a critical race theorist. She spoke this story that space people came and would relieve all American debt policy, etc., if all African Americans in the US were given to them. Typical research is a few sides of an issue. Institutional Ethnography instead look at this within a larger system. Race and how race relations are are different in different contexts. IE tries to address some of this.

I need to look for a research method / framework for this liveblogging research.

Tonette spoke about the way that researchers

social practice is embedded in particular social context.

Eberything around white people is around whiteness as being the norm. Likewise, outside the US the US seems to see itself as the norm.

IE looks at the micro and the macro. It is a critical ethnography. The institution in IE is not always an organization. Rather, it is about institutional systems that cross many sites, such as systemic racism. Ethnography is a method that helps us look at culture. It is a way to look at local settings and administration.

This method helps us to surface voices that often do not get problemetized.

individual experiences are organized by larger power relations.

Thus, when we look at an issue, there are many factors that feed into an issue.

The goal is to uncover and actively combat the power relations asking  “How does this happen as it does?” Ruling relations, and an analysis of power.

Using IE, there are many latyers and issues involeved with how th problem is identified and then used. This method is not about the topic or object, but raryyhter the entry point into undertsanding the ruling relations. She discussed the various ways of observing and then colecting data. She gave lots of examples from the book she mentioend, and then she spoke about hw to train to be a good observer. This also includes document analysis and formal policies in a workplace. then, look at the poliicies in place within the local community that feeds into the power relationships. The training is more about how to observe and be a good observer.

Data findings in IE. Create a map or diagram or flowchart of the way the power moves. Then uncover the texts and the stories and how they are in the power relations that come out in new ways. One of the findings is to have new policies put into place and then make a difference back in the organizational structures. It should not just stay within an academic context.

Uncovers limitations.

The same baggage we take within us in relationships is the same as when we are learning.

This is based on the work of Dorothy Smith, where the work is based on feminism. A question from the audience discussing how things are institutionalized because they repeat regularly until they are institutionalized as lived and embodied senses of power within our organizations and how we are actually.

Some good quesitons about this methodology.

Technorati Tags: Tonette Rocco

Elizabeth A. Peterson & Stephen D. Brookfield

Their paper came out of conversations between the two of them for several years, they thought this was a problem that this has not been done in some time. There is a real need in this country for a dialogue, such as with Michael Richards and his tirade and then with Don Imus and his comments and firing. ONce that flurry comes, then it will die out. They then wanted to have a one on one discussion. It is difficult for two people, one black and one white to have this dialioge (she is black and he is white). When whites think about racism, they are thinking about overtly racist act. Comments Imus made were socially unaccessptible. Thus, since whites find those things unacceptable, and those acts were rascist, thus whites do not see other evidence of racism

Thus, there is a disconnect and inability to come to an understanding of racism.

First positioned seld in critical race theory and then critical theory, and then they moved within their own narratives and their childhood experiences.

She recalled the first time she was called the N word, when she was in 9 in fourth grade. Then, in the school, the boys were told to apologize, but due to a subsequent color-blind policy that is put into place, overt racism was stopped, but there was still a lot of more quiet / subtle ones were still experienced.

Critical race theory - with Brookfield - he is English, so does not have a personal life. In CRT, there is often a personal story that is described. He recounted a story when he got into a fight when he was 17, When a black service man came and acted as a peacemaker and told them to break up the fight, Brookfield recounted how the black man as a peacemaker. This disrupted how he saw blacks as violent and whites as supremicists and peacemakers. HIs other counter-story against white supremacy was when he went to hear Malcolm X.

Brookfield is seen as a gatekeeper within the academy, and he has benefited from white supremacy. He does not prefer to use the term white privilege, which he sees as too benign. He then recounted a story when he was approached by the Harvard Educational Review to write a paper. They wanted him to write a central paper and then have his colleagues write responses, as they did not want a special issue. At first, there seemed to be a lot of energy with the editors who seemed exciting about the project and the value of that kind of project. The irony is that the white man (stephen) would write and then the others (all black) would then be invited to respond to his paper on racial issues in adult education.

ELizabeth commented how the room was packed because they wanted to see Stephen, and not particularly since they were interested in their research.

There then were some questions

Whites constantly moves the goalposts, so race is something that white people do not need to deal with, so even on some campuses the only black person on campus may be the officer of diversity.

One question was about how some white people really do not get critical white studies or critical queer studies comes from CRT and its guidance.

Elizabeth stated that whites are a race.

There was a question to Stephen about how white folks need to speak about race as white folks.

He spoke about how, when a black student speaks in class, he sometimes is hesitant to offer any criticism, to most allow for that voice to come out in its fullness, as if he offered some criticism it would be seen as how his voice is so full of authority that obviously nobody would disagree. Elizabeth thought that this was good that he brings this out into the light and discusses it, so it shows how he gets this, even though he has suffered through these issues as well.

There were some good questions and discussions about how the Harvard Education Review and their board no longer  

Technorati Tags: AERC2007, live blogging, liveblogging, live-blogging, aerc, Stephen Brookfield

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Robin and I somehow seemed to be the first to lunch, which was in another building up the hill. What a pretty campus this is, with the buildings build in and on the hills. We shoveled food into our mouths (yummy turkey and gravy sandwiches). We took some pictures on the campus, and then went back to polish our presentation tomorrow.

Laura L. Bierema and Julia Storburg-Walker

They introduced themselves, and ised PowerPoints

They are committed feminists, and are frustrated that in the HRD world is a little incomplete and thinks that HRED is being coopeted by a paradigm hegemonic dynamics

systems thinking, psycology, and ethics according to Swanson — they think is a little incomokete

HRD is also dominated by women, but it is the masculine and white males who lead the field and make more money and really lead the field. Julia spoke about how Laura helped Julia become more of a feminist thinker. As she is not tenured, she has to speak differently than Laura, who is.

Thet traced the masculine roots of HRD and how, in the 1920’s there was the change from

INterested that this women was not heard since she was not given a voice.

They did a text analysis to see how language was used in classic management texts. The framework is menist po-structuralist and post-modernist

Alvesson and Deetz (2000) is what they used to build upon. Bradshaw 1996 - methodology of deconstruction with categories, dichotomies, and false oppositions

They perpetuate the status quo with the pitting against of opposites and dicotomies between critical theorists and those who are more practical. The binaries are taught that there is performance and there is learning, not both

They mentioned Rothberger in 1949 and then in 1965 HBR classic of the manager. They identified some of the more important work, and then closely read the text and had conversations about how they undertsood the text, and then used the Holt and Swanson textbook

how the text creates these false bunaries, and how they power is or is not being dealth with, such as using a false dichomy and harmonious song that performance is the dominant piint, and then criticizes anybody who sees this in another way as being naive (Swanson etxt). Are critical of women, people of color, and non-management. This can be seen as the onecept of inleasing human performance. They use “quotations” in deconstruction as side lanuage in a text.

Bradshw used a post-structural analysis methodology

This paper is simiilar to the one they presented at the AHRD conference in 2007. The audience here is probabably more open to their message, though they also probably have less of an orietnaiton in the HRD field. in AHRD, this is a similar issue

Biremea uses the  Walton text instead of the Swanson text

The 3-legged stool of Swanson:

1. econoimics
2. psychology
3. systems theory

thet want to take the stool and give it a feminist perspective for their next AHRD paper

their anslysis, theu make no claims to the truth,  theyt are an interpretation and helps them to undertstand their work. This is their qualitative perspective. I thought this was an excellent point, in that they are not trying to state their perspective as being definite. Good qualitative research here.

They then discussed more about Rothlessburgger’s The Foreman. I recall this as being a review of and continuation of the paper they presented at last year’s conference, One of the points is that this is that management is objective and can “fix” the foreman.

HRD text gives 0 space to diversity, gender, sexuality, social responsibility, managerialism, racism

MY QUESTION - social responsibility (as not being in Swanson) is getting to be a big topic in the business schools as they can be shown as how companies are strategicly trying to show they are interested in being good corporate citizens. Is this just a marketing scheme or it this real proactive?

adult education is different from HRD — where the organization controls the learning process

Their book is that performance is the song, and as think such claims are flagrant expressions of masuline rationality

MY QUESTION — Why is that book so popular then?

They took an editorial Swanson gave in HRDQ - we should only be doing unisex resaerch . Bierema states that they have always done masculine research as the norm. This is the sense that feminist reseasrach will insert a bias, and from their post-structural research he is asusming their has never been a masuline bias in the research. Laura inserted this without Julia knowing it, since Swanson was Julia’s dissertation advisor

Recommendations — take gender into account when developing HRD research?

MY QUESTION - My perception is that men find it threatening whenever gender issues are raised, since that seems to feed into Swanson’s concern. What strategies can be used to get around that so the issues can be raised without people (men) being threatened and turning off to the issues before they are even raised?

Then there was time for questions. I wonder why the audience was so small for this conference, and he said they have to be aware of the binary elements they are bringing to this, since they are doing a post-structuralist work and may be hard to draw conclusions. hey are selecting these as wexamples, and while they may be fixed in the text as examples, they are posisbliy being used as examples.

They are having discussion about words and how they are used. Julia does not want to have words block

cultural () theory — there is a need to challenge the symbols, as they are all hegemonic. Also, HRD may have come along to silence those with issues, such as racial or sexist, by showing how perfomrance can be improved and oppresses workers.

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The doors to the upsatirs entrance to the auditorium were initially locked, so I had to walk down to 4 and then into the auditorium and then back to the top back on 5. These things happen!

John Holst, Robert H. Bahruth, and Maria Alicia Vetter (translator)

Felipe de J. Perez Cruz

Maria Luisa de Aquiar Amorim

WHile getting ready for this session, I learned another best practice. Know the route, if possible, between the confernce venue rooms. That will facilitate packing the computer and materials away and then traveling to those other locations to get a seat and, more importantly, a plug. If there are no plugs available, then schedule time during the day to recharge the battery, if there is not a backup battery.

I also just learned that it may be important to have a 3 into 2 adaptor for the electrical plug.

Another best practice is to schedule time to correct the entries (spell check, edit grammar and missed words and the like.

It may be important to have a discllaimer as to how much of the sessions is being recorded as objectively as possible, as well as to what extent there is personal interpretation or opinion. While, as a qualitative researcher, I do not believe any liveblogging can be objective and completely free from the experiences and worldview of the author, I do think that this should be discussed at some point for the purpose of full disclosure to assist in credibility of the research itself.

Another component of full-disclosure will be the intentionality–how possitive and upbeatshould thi sbe

This is the 40th anniversary of Paulo Freire’s text, as well as the 19th Anniversay of his death.

The session overview was given for this panel discussion, with how this will work and with the panelists. Maria

felipe Cruz from Cuba and the

ROlando Punto in Chile

Maria Luisa de Aguiar Amorim - she began speaking in Spanish, with a translator and English slides translations on a PowerPoint projected above the stage where they were sitting. Unfortunetly, the slides were basically fill-text with paragraphs, and the like. It was basically like reading a Word document. My collegue sitting next to me questioned the accuracy of the translation of the presenter’s Spanish into English. I am finding this session challenging, with the two languages (the presenter spoke in Spanish and was translated) as well as with all the information on the slides.

Another best practice — along with creating basic templates for each intended session, make sure the name of the presentation and all the presenters will be listed and corrceted for accuracy.

Best practice also - how much editing should be done? Should it just be for completion, or should new insights be added? I think I will clean up the posts for spelling, grammar, and syntax, and any other insights will be posted in new posts as they arise. This will allow for the accuracy of the experience of learning as it happens.

As this is within an academic community, which is a small, intimate, and somewhat closed system–how can a researcher within this field itself be publically critical of something in a session, knowing that the other colleagues in the room are also the reviewers, program planners, and hiring and tenure committee members? Should criticisms be tempered intentionally, or should they be more poitically stated? I think I will be as polite here as I try to be with others when I speak. I will not hide issues that arise, but I will also express them in a way that is positive in intention–I want to help scholarship progress and advance, not to stifle the research efforts of my colleagues. I am wondering how liveblogging will affect this process.

It is wonderful to be around these people who knew and worked with Paulo Freire.

Another issue–with the editing later, since there is no wifi access here, should links to the people who present, their papers online, and the issues they raise be linked from the posts later? If I were on WiFi, should I do that at the same time? as theere is not Wifi access, I will consider this issue for later, when I do have Internet access back in the Hotel room. One thing I will not do, however, is to change the content of what I record, as that would cloud my live data gathering experience. I do not think this would be ethical as a researcher, since this methodology has me recording the experiences as I experience them as the day progresses.

It appears Maria has gone over time, and the moderator and the panelists and translator and a few audience members discussed it in Spanish, which was like an inside conversation as I could not follow it. Looking a the expressions on many of the people in the audience, it seems others may not have followed it either. Ahh, I just understood her to say “In conclusion . . .”

For the best practices or rather for the data perspective, if I miss something that I later recall, how should this be added? Should it be placed where it is remembered sequinetially, or back in the real location if it has not yet been published?

Felipe from Cuba spoke in Spanish, with the translator translating his speaking sentence by sentence without PowerPoint slides. This seemed more engaging, as I knew what to listen to and when I could not. He had a paper in the Poceedings.

The lighting just went on on the stage, over the panelists.

Felipe spke that Freire was born into the world as an educator in the same kind of world that is like Cuba. For him, Castro and Che Guevara are the pedagogues of the revoluion, calling himself a revolutionary pedagogue. In the begininnning of the 60’s his relationshio

What should the blog titles be? The subject, name of the session, or the name of the author? Should it include the conference title or abbreviation, also? I think I will use the title of the session, as that will help time stamp it for consisency. It will also shoow how my recording is occurring as it occurs.

The practice of the revolution in Cuba and the revolutions in Africa, relationship with, and there were thousands of revolutionaries in Africa fighting for revolutions there.

Perhaps readers can comment as to what I captured, verses how others in the audience who may read this can comment on this. Additionally, should the authors be contacted once the blog post has been done, so they can comment on it if they wish?

Do the presenter’s need to give permoission for this? I do not think so, since I am recording my perspective as a researcher who is experiencing this from my own perspective.

The speaker feels more comfortable with the Marxist ideals , but Marxism . . .  Im missed

Rolando - he spoke next, and was translated at the same time. I believe this was his name, and will confirm it later. This followed the same format with his speaking and the translator

Speaking about 40 years after Freire and Education as a Process for (missed the title, will grab later)

Looking around at the audience while I adjusted my laptop, I see some people sleeping. I suppose this may happen at times, but I never noticed.

in Latin America, ciritcal pedagogy is having a rebith. The Latin Amreicam conferece of social sciences, 5 years ago there was a group that was convened to discuss the social scuecned trying to restate the team of critical theory in an effort to re-found the relfection on the role of social science in the development of a revolutionary group in the social science. They are meeting once a year to discuss these subjects as we are here to discuss today. 2 aspects of Freire are essential–1. The subject of subjectivity and intersubjectivity, and then is the theme of critical reason. Why these two themes or sujects? After 40 years, there are the same problems.

1. 1. Increase of poverty
2. 2. polarization in terms of saleries
3. 3.  LIttle effort put into science and technology
4. diversity and multiculturalism to difne public measures and policies.

With the exception of Cuba, the governments in Latin America think of these qualities in terms of others, and not of themselves. Interesting, as he appears to be supportive of Castro and Cuba as it is now.

Those who speak for the public are elite groups who speak about what they think people need. Thus, when they speak of subkjectivity and intersubjectivity, this is a theme that is valid today and must continue to be discussed today. Many of us who work today, he said, we speak about the transformation and a revolutionaery role. To summarize his proposal in his conclusion, he said in pedagogy of the oppressed, Paulo Freire defined, for the first time in his work, what the role of education with 5 aspects of education that are essecntial

1. Subjective relation or intersubjectivity as an adult educator and adult students are what he calls a dialogue
2. this situation must have speace in educational time to constrct. In other words, we construct knowledge that allows the transformation of the subject and the transformation of the world in which the subject lives
3. the educational content which mediates the tranlation of mediocracy to epistemologically … but what he means is to use the historiacal dialectical method
4. Ethical construction of values and knoweldge and emancipating elements
5. enoraous tranformality of the subject, then in Marxist terms would mean the revolutionary transformation.

The curriculum is a social construction, so, a transformative currilum is the essence of a curriulum of adults. If it is good for adults, then it is good for children. As educators, we have to change our perception of students and accept that person as a legitimate person as that age as entities that are constructed in their own ways. Finally, This analigy has to start valuing other accees. We are essentially body, and we are eseentially emotional beings, and it is practically impossible that we do not have music and art in out curriculum, and only gives importaance of other things, and this is a result of a capitalist effort, that has not made us happy.

Robert BAhruth - spoke in English to try to give how some of this can be seen in the United States. We have all read and interpreted Freire in our own contexts. Like the analigy of the 6 blind men and the elephant. They all held different parts and insist that the way they see it is the correct way. This is similiar to Freire and how we see his work. He wanted to contextuallize it in a variety of differnet ways. With critical pedagogy, once we get away from the banking model. In the US we have a lot of monolingual experts in bilingual education. The first goal in education is children. If we have a democratization in the schools, and students become a part of this, then they will learn about this in their own lives. For adult education, how do we undo the effects of schooling where they were the subjects of the banking model. From his perspective, if there is a ruthless cutthroat basteard who can speak more than one language, then he can skrew up 2 cultures instead of just one.

Philosophy of compensatory of education, with a view that some people are better than others. Thus, some things are funded based on the pivilege of the class that runs the institution. Class and the assumed lack of intelligence start to believe that they are less than or not worthy. Freire always started that he showed that people have a lot of rigor in their daily lives, to dmeonstrate to them that they are capable of learning and thus worthy of learning in the everyday. This was to bring the students from object to subject. LIstens to their daliy routines and then marvel at how much they know in their own ways who have their own interlligances of other people who are closer to the earth. Freire did this to help undo the work that was done to make these people believe they were less and thus could not learn.No Child Left Behind hurts those and keep people from being creative as cultural workers, rather by having them follow a standadized curriculum that forces a single cultural persoective on everybody–this repeats the process and inequality. Femiinism is important since this affects the culture of not being worthy and and accept .80 on the 1.00 as do men. Taking this continues the patriarchal.

When Castro took over, there was an 11% literacy rate. Poverty in Cuba now is because of the embargo of the US. UNESCO relased literacy rates–97% literacy rate there now, which is the number 1 in the world as of last year. He brought in books, some critical of MArxism and some not–there was no censorship of the books he brought in and there did not seem to be any censorship in their discussions. He said the US did not have UNESCO do this, and self-reported a 98%

There is a sense that Freire is for the 3rd world, but many parts of the US are the same way. The compensatroy movement which looks at people as lacking rather than as needing education. To colonize them in the same way is to continue the oppressors status quo

The ideal is for all of us to become critical educators where the curriculums we are given reproduce hegemonic oppressors and continues the oppression.

Little time for questions. One question suggested a theory of action that includes a critical role in criticism of organiazations. He stated that we need theories of education of organizations, since that will then bring those people back out into the world.

We have to think abot subjects in terms of groups. They then discussed groups and at the base of organizations.

It seems that the US perspective as Cuba being the Communisy place with the rest of Latin America being working fordemocracy. This does not seem to be the case as I am listening to it now.

Technorati Tags: AERC2007, liveblogging, live blogging, live-blogging, Freire

Just before the session began, a colleague came up to say hello, Tom Bettinger.

A bagpiper just came in, leading te conference co-chair, Jim Sharpe. He welcomed the 300 delegates to the conference, as well as showed how this is such a global group, with many people from Canada, the US, Australia, and elsewhere.

The welcome involved a brief history of the university setting, Mount Saint Vincent University, a small liberal arts college in Halifax.

Patricia Gouthro then gave some logistics as to where the sessions are. Copies of the program are on the board, a regrets board, small emergency board, and then a message board all exist. The cafeteria is open, but it is in another building. Note to self–bring my own water!

There will be editors of various journals at one of the sessions.

The caucus group sessions have spaces, as well as professional spaces. There were a lot of logistics that were quickly presented, but one would really need to have the conference book out to take notes. A large data dump of very valuable information to be sure.

Another best practice — adjust computer time if the conference is in a new time zone to have accurate blog postings.

Some of the professional journals and organizations are mentioned.

Social sessions. Practitioner researcher roundtable on Saturday morning with New Directtions for practitioner research. Speak with Jim Sharper about this. They will tape the session to try to publish from it.

This evening there will be the banquet, at the hotel where I am staying. However, the conference hotel is 15-20 minutes away. The social events, dinners, lunches, and other sessions were discussed, as well as where the coffee will be during the breaks. The poster sessions were mentioned, as well as the sessions and how the program is divided into the difference sessions on the 3 floors.

There was also confusion as to which hotel has the banquet tonight. The owning compnay has two hotels, and the one fro tonight will be in the delta Halifax, and not the Delta Berrington (the conference hotel venue).

As I am preparing for the first session of the conference today, I have been doing a lot of thinking about best practices for liveblogging, many of which I am learning while engaging in this process. I will combine whatever I learn into a single list at the end of this research.

1. Have an extension cord. I always used to carry one in my computer bag, a long one with multiple plugs at the end. I removed this since it was too heavy, so will have to take time during our break to go buy a new, lighter one.
2. Make sure there is full, long-charged battery. As I learned from our Welcome session that I am preparing for, there may be locations (such as this auditorium) that do not have many outlets. Thus, do not count on having a power source.
3. WiFi is not ubiquitous. While we like to hope and even think that wireless access is open and available in every conference, this is still not a reality.
4. Have a camera with a cord to connect to the computer. While a camera is very useful, traveling to the venue with its cord to be able to synch the images, upload to the website or a service such as Flickr, will save lots of time later in the day adding these and then reposting the entries.
5. Consider what to say while engaging in liveblogging if asked. I learned last night, when I first mentioned this project to a few colleagues at the reception, some of them looked quizically. One even mentioned that academics would not be interested in this work since they like to have their writing refined and polished before it is made public. While refining and polishing is something that is useful for the tenure review process, I responded that this is a research project in itself, and I am more concerned that I capture the data (information from the sessions) as it happens, since the polishing and refinement (which in the case of blogging means writing and rewriting for permanent posting) is something that may not be possible with this endeavor, from a practical perspective as well as from a data-gathering perspective in this case. As a side-point, this same person asked a practical question about how will somebody find this research. While the short answer is that it is amazing how people find blog entries, my intention is to present my findings at a conference next year and then publish from this experience, which will in turn make this more public.
6. Use an offline blog editor. If at all possible, determine which sessions will be attended and then create basic postings for each that list the sessions / speakers for each one. This will allow for each entried to have a simple template, or home, for when things begin. Remember to adjust the times to the actual sessions.
7. Adjust the laptop computer time if this is in another time zone. This will allow for accurate time stamping for the posts.
8. Consider whether to use a camera to add to the visual elements, or not

Ahh, the opening is beginning.