2025 Virginia federation conference
What can one learn from attending this special education meeting?
The Virginia Federation of the Council for Exceptional Children holds its annual conference on 5, 6, and 7 November 2025 in Virginia Beach. Registration for the conference is available. Here is the advertising flier:
The keynote speaker is Michael J. Kennedy, is familiar to many readers of Special Education Today (see this post from 21 January 2022 for a reminder). I asked Michael what he was going to talk about and he told me, “I plan to talk about the integration of the High-Leverage Practices for Students with Disabilities with well known evidence-based practices.” He continued, “I’ll emphasize the foundational nature of HLPs such as collaboration, making data-driven decisions, using explicit instruction, and intensifying supports as core components of daily special education practice to help students succeed in the general education curriculum.”
Michael is well known for his informative and enjoyable presentations. This one should be marked by both of those characteristics. It should be fun!
And there will also be lots of additional subjects covered at the sessions. The organizers listed these topics: Early Childhood Special Education, Supervising & Collaborating with Paraprofessionals, Writing Instruction in the Classroom, Transition Planning, Building Executive Functioning Skills, Adolescent Literacy Skills & Instruction, Writing IEP, PLAAFPs & Goals, Specially Designed Instruction K-12, Alcohol & Substance Use Prevention.
Visit the Virginia CEC Web page for the conference for additional information (e.g., hotel reservations, cost, detailed schedule, etc.).
I wish I could hear Michael's speech - it sounds very interesting in light of a project that our Ohio Dean's Compact did a couple years ago. We were comparing high leverage practices across teaching fields to determine commonalities. We wanted to determine if there were practices that all new teachers should know regardless of field.