Recalling NCTE 2018 by: Joseph O'Such

For the past 4 NCTE conventions, I have been fortunate enough to not only be an attendee of the convention, but also a presenter as part of the #bowtieboys. Since the 2015 convention in Minneapolis, I have always come back from NCTE with a drive to carry on the lessons I learned. But I have never written about my experience. I wish to share my personal experience, as in the way no two snowflakes are the same, no two NCTE experiences are the same. 

Thursday:

Waking up before 6:00 A.M. isn’t commonplace for me. Yet due to my experience with cross country and track, the idea of waking up this early isn’t completely alien. So when I set my 5:45 alarm, I was ready. After a quick banana and tying my bow tie with haste, I departed my house, en-route to the airport. Despite the fact school had been canceled due to weather, there seemed to be nothing outside that would indicate so. Yet as I arrived at the airport and meandered my way through security and terminals, I made it (with my fellow #bowtieboys) to our designated gate. Having not seen the outside conditions since arriving, I was expecting the same old boring look. Wrong. Snow was coming down, and it was already sticking. Yet our plane was delayed for a meager 40 minutes, so all seemed under control. We boarded the plane and to our surprise, every single seat had a personal TV in front of it. As I was waiting to ask for a pair of headphones for the TV, I realized that the plane was boarded, and we haven’t moved. As I finally got headphones, I popped on Avengers Infinity War, and plunged myself into one of my favorite Marvel movies. Throughout the whole thing, I was interrupted variably by announcements, each one pushing back the takeoff time. As I finished the movie (which is over 2 hours), we still hadn’t taken off. Finally, nearly three hours after the scheduled takeoff, the plane de-iced and took off. The rest of my flight was punctuated by school work and another movie (Ant Man and the Wasp). We finally landed in Houston at the time of B session. At that time, we made a group decision to not attend the general session and tend to our bellies, which were screaming in hunger. Fortunately, we were able to attend the middle level meet up, which consisted of Chris Lehman and author Duncan Tonatiuh. Tonatiuh was a fantastic advocate for migrant workers, and his work often reflected that. One of his books was about a rabbit on the search for his father which had gone away to work. The rabbit paid a coyote to guide him but when the rabbit ran out of food to pay the coyote, it targeted the rabbit. The story was a metaphor for crossing into America with references such a “the land north” and “a wall that was too tall to scale and too long to go around”.  Chris Lehman also did a fantastic job framing the entire presentation. After our sole session, we head back to the hotel to eat in the restaurant there. I no doubt enjoyed the meal, but the most entertaining part was when someone, who was obviously trying to mess with me, asked me what was in the nachos on our table. After I guessed, they pointed to the adjacent table saying that the occupants wanted to buy the nachos, and left. After that, I went up to bed for the night.

Friday:

Despite the later wake up time of 6:30, as compared to 5:45 the previous day, I felt far groggier as I woke from my slumber. As the #bowtieboys departed to the general session, I felt a little more energetic, but not by much. Then as I arrived at the general session, I was elated. At a conference whose them was student voice, there were students presenting at the general session! Olivia Van Ledjte and Marley Dias brought an optimism about books which in conjunction with the vendors, prompted an urge to read that was unparalleled with anything I had felt in a long time. Zephyrus Todd and Jordyn Zimmerman both brought both of their unique perspectives to the table. As a transgender student, Zephyrus told of the personal struggle to discover ones self, and how it is unlike anything else. Jordyn Zimmerman indirectly spoke of her struggle of not being able to really speak and how that forced her to grow. Sara Abou Rasheed’s story was similar to that which Duncan Tonatiuh advocates for. Sara had to come to the US with essentially no English skills, and had grown to be a member of her poetry club and shared something I will remember forever: The America Poem. The intensity in which she spoke and the meaning of what she spoke struck my heart like a beating drum, and told me America is good, but we make it bad. Coming from someone who moved here a few years ago, it was extremely impactful. And finally, Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, whose lax state calmed my mind for what would not be the last time. His passion for hip hop was a mirror of sorts for the #bowtieboys own experience of educational rapping. Then we had our first presentation of the conference at the famous Nerdy Book Club round table. Although the 15 of us presented at a single round table, we managed to thoroughly discuss 15 books which look at a diverse group of characters with unique struggles. During the following D session, the group raided the vendors for books and also ate a brief lunch as I prepped for what I thought would be the scared session. This was the famous Laura Robb round table session, with table leaders: Gravity Goldberg, Mary Howard, Lester Laminack, Donalyn Miller, Harvey Daniels, Linda Rief, Pernille Ripp, and Jim Burke to name a few. Clearly a powerhouse, even though Laura Robb was unable to attend due to weather. Now our part was to open the session with an authentic rap on the NCTE theme of student voice, which was clearly a theme that we could relate with. Our rap was to the tune of Empire State of Mind by: Jay-Z, and had a focus on the journey of a student and what they potentially go through at school. After our opener, the #bowtieboys diffused among the 20 roundtables. The first table I attended was Pernille Ripp’s. She asks here students deep questions like “Why does reading suck?” and “What are your reading rights?”. Her table explored ways to create a classroom based around student input which is a dream come true for many students, myself included. The second round table I attended was Donalyn Miller’s. She introduced fantastic websites to use for organizing the class room love of reading like flip grid and mustie. Donalyn’s love of books was as clear as ever in both her roundtable and in the  C-session Nerdy Book Club. Then we went to our final session of the day, which was the first of two IGNITE sessions of the conference. IGNITE sessions are rapid fire, with each speaker allocated a mere 5 minutes. The #bowtieboys opened up the IGNITE with another rap, this one based on Remember the Name by Fort Minor, based on the view of a student who has the potential to make a splash in the world, and has to overcome the school system. The preceding presentations were a blur of rotations and quick side chats, but two specific presentations stayed with me. The first was by Bill Bass, who opened his presentation with his interest in photography and how he used YouTube as a major source of learning and how students can learn from such sources. The second was by a nurse who taught us one breathing technique to calm down. The technique was repeated five times and consisted of breathing in, holding, breathing out, and holding for five seconds each. The point was to reduce student stress, which was coincidentally the theme of our roundtable the very next day. At the end of the session, I went up to her and told her that the #bowtieboys were presenting the very next day on student stress and that I would love her to come as she would be knowledgeable on the subject.  As we left the IGNITE, we were told of a “surprise”. Before our formal dinner, we went back to the hotel and got in the pool! As Spencer Hill, one of the #bowtieboys said at the pool, “work hard, play hard." After the fun, we quickly got ready for dinner, which was at the famous Three Forks restaurant. After almost four hours, we left dinner and I went to bed mentally prepping for the other half of our sessions the next day.

Saturday:

I woke up Saturday with more energy than any other day which was to be in my favor. Our roundtable was at 8:00 and we were to arrive at least 15 minutes early. Despite the early start time, there was good attendance. Each roundtable had two presenters, and my partner was Spencer. The highlight of our presentation was a fun and cheesy quiz that determined if the teacher was more like Spencer or myself in terms of time management. Immediately after our session was over, we made it to the general session a little late, which looking back on it I partly regret as this general session was spearheaded by Christopher Emdin, whose rallying call touched me, and I’m not even a teacher! Not only did he fully utilize the "power zone," but he was also very honest, and told the audience some things they might not want to here. He did thoroughly back up everything he said with facts and charisma. Although I did leave the session mildly disappointed from being so close to asking a question, I was none the less in a good mood as I headed to the second IGNITE session, where the #bowtieboys once again opened with our Remember the Name rap. One part of the IGNITE session that stuck with me was that fiction is more rigorous than non-fiction. However, David Finkle, who put forth this opinion, showed several PowerPoint slides with lists of what a writer needs to keep track of in fiction vs. non-fiction. While the non-fiction list took up one slide, the fiction took up three. After eating lunch during J-session, we headed into our final session which was a panel with Linda Rief and Lester Laminack with a theme on reading. The #bowtieboys discussed several aspects of how reading both books and other media has shaped our lives. We then went to L session which was headed by Cornelius Minor who discussed how reading needs to conform to students (not the other way around). "There should not be five books every student must read." As I left the convention center after Saturday for dinner and more pool time, I realized there was only one day left of NCTE.

Sunday:

Sunday was brief but the three session I attended were all amazing. The first was a session that was introduced by Penny Kittle and followed the story of Hanna Al-Jibouri and Karen Workun and their incredible work with teaching poetry to incarcerated women in Oklahoma (where the rate of incarceration of women is twice the national average and the prison system is notorious for creating an endless cycle of heading in and out of prison). The next session was the featured N-session, and rightfully so. The session presented several successful ideas for bring technology into the class room and the power that something as simple as a picture can invoke. Finally, the Sunday general session with Paul and Peter Reynolds told me something very important. In the world where many strive to speak with a complex tongue, sometimes simplicity has immense power.

Looking back on NCTE this year, I can confidently say that I had the most fun this year. As with most things in life, it was the people who surrounded me that made NCTE what it was. I’m not just talking about the #bowtieboys, I am talking about all the people I interacted with at the conference, whether they were presenting, coming up to me with the all familiar, “So what do you guys (the #bowtieboys) do?”, commenting on my presentations, or even just saying hello, made my conference. I hope for even greater things in the years to come and I am already getting excited for NCTE 2019 in the nearby city (for me at least) in Baltimore.