2011 Conference of the Americas
We are pleased to announce that the 2011 Conference of the Americas will take place in San Antonio, Texas, USA. The conference is scheduled to be held from 21 – 24 July 2011.
Please click here to access the full conference program: 
[6 MB, pdf]
Registration is now CLOSED for the 2011 Conference of the Americas. Participants are still able to register for pre-conference sessions. Please note that you must have purchased a full conference registration in order to attend a pre-conference session and you may only register for and attend one pre-conference session. For more information about the pre-conference sessions, please click here.
The 2011 conference is the perfect professional development opportunity for heads of schools, coordinators, teachers, district and school board officials of IB World Schools as well as university and government representatives throughout the Americas. This is a unique opportunity to hear from best-selling author and humanitarian, Khaled Hosseini, along with featured speakers and seasoned breakout presenters sharing best practices in international education.
Plenary speakers
Khaled Hosseini graduated from high school in 1984 and enrolled at Santa Clara University where he earned a bachelor's degree in Biology in 1988. The following year, he entered the University of California-San Diego's School of Medicine, where he earned a Medical Degree in 1993. He completed his residency at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles. Hosseini was a practicing internist between 1996 and 2004. While in medical practice, Hosseini began writing his first novel, The Kite Runner, in March of 2001. In 2003, The Kite Runner, was published and has since become an international bestseller, published in 48 countries. In 2006 he was named a goodwill envoy to UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency. His second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns was published in May of 2007. Currently, A Thousand Splendid Suns is published in 40 countries. Khaled has been working to provide humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan through The Khaled Hosseini Foundation. The concept for The Khaled Hosseini Foundation was inspired by a trip to Afghanistan Khaled made in 2007 with the UNHCR. He lives in northern California.
María Nieves Tapia is the founder and director of the Latin American Center for Service Learning (Centro Latinoamericano de Aprendizaje y Servicio Solidario, CLAYSS. Since 1993, she promotes the service learning pedagogy as an approach to youth involvement and the improvement of educational quality. In 2001 she was awarded the “Alec Dickson Servant Leader Award”. She was a founding member of the International Association for Research on Service Learning and Community Engagement (2005). She María Nieves Tapia is a history teacher with over 30 years of experience in secondary, post-secondary and university teaching; she was an assistant professor of Ancient History at Universidad Católica Argentina until 2000. She has written many books and articles published in Spanish, English, Portuguese and Italian, including the books Aprendizaje y servicio solidario en el sistema educativo y las organizaciones juveniles (Buenos Aires, 2006) and La solidaridad como pedagogía (Buenos Aires, 2000).
Craig Kielburger is the co-founder of Free The Children, a unique international development and youth empowerment organization. Since 1995, Free The Children has become the world’s leading youth-driven charity, inspiring an entire generation to stand up and have their voices heard. Craig is also the co-founder of Me to We. This social enterprise encourages ethical living and social responsibility, while also aiming to bring Free The Children’s already low administrate rate to 0%, ensuring every penny goes to charitable programs. Craig has been awarded many national and international awards for his work, including The Roosevelt Freedom Medal, The World Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child (often called the Children’s Nobel Prize) and he is one of the youngest recipients of The Order of Canada. He has a degree in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Toronto and is the youngest-ever graduate of the Kellogg-Schulich Executive MBA program. He has received nine honorary doctorates for his work in the field of education and human rights. He is the co-author of three national bestsellers. His latest book, The World Needs Your Kid: Raising Children Who Care and Contribute, features a foreword by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Linda Darling-Hammond is the Charles E. Ducommon Professor of Education at the Stanford University School of Education, where she launched the School Redesign Network, the Stanford Educational Leadership Institute, and the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education. Darling-Hammond is author or editor of more than a dozen books and more than 300 articles on education policy and practice. Her work focuses on school restructuring, teacher education, and educational equity. Darling-Hammond received her B.A. magna cum laude at Yale University and an Ed.D., with highest distinction, in urban education at Temple University.
