Announcing the IllinoisCivics Summer PD Tour

As alluded to in our preliminary post last month, teacher professional development opportunities are central to our #CivicsIsBack Campaign. We are building a train-the-trainer model, where a cadre of teacher mentors representing every region of Illinois will receive intense training during the first full week of June in Bloomington-Normal. For the balance of the summer, mentors will be deployed to two-day workshops that touch every corner of the state.

These workshops, held in partnership with local colleges, universities, and Regional Offices of Education, will center on teaching the 2016 Election, but address all facets of the new civics course requirement, related updates to state social studies standards, and perhaps most importantly, why civic learning matters (visit our recent four-part series on this subject).


Attendees will also learn more about the programs, curricula, and resources of nationally-recognized civic education partners, Constitutional Rights Foundation Chicago, Facing History and Ourselves, and Mikva Challenge.

To view our full calendar of regional workshops this coming summer, please click here. Each of the workshops is hyperlinked to an online registration form. We encourage you to register at your earliest convenience as space at each location is limited.

Although you are welcome to attend the workshop most convenient to you, we have attempted to serve the entire state and thus allocated each of the state’s 102 counties to one of nine regional trainings. A map making these demarcations clear is accessible here.

Finally, please note that the Illinois Civics Teacher Academy, included within the Professional Development Calendar, is an initiative of Kankakee Community College. It entails are more intensive four-day experience with residential options for out-of-town attendees, and focuses specifically on law-related education.

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