Dr. Tyson began the Mabry Film Festival in 2001 as a way to integrate technology into the instructional plan of the school. He has seen firsthand the power of media production in a middle school setting. Producing digital media content is not only well within the financial grasp of most schools, students have the capacity to create compelling and deeply moving content of the same quality you can find at your local video store. While in many ways this medium is the language of their generation, producing student work of exceptional quality does not just happen by "turning students loose" with a video camera and a computer. This session will provide ideas and insight into ways you can leverage the unprecedented excitement of a film festival in your own school community, making learning irresistible while building support for deeper use of technology tools. Few things excite students and parents more than a large audience's critical acclaim of student work. Dr. Tyson will explore ways to make the educational experience of your students more rigorous and demanding by bringing their meaningful contributions to life on the big screen.

How can school leadership maximize student engagement and academic achievement? How can leaders encourage teachers and students to collaborate with peers and professionals around the world? In this presentation and workgroup session, Dr. Tim Tyson, former principal of Mabry Middle School, will share lessons learned and philosophical frameworks gleaned from that school's exploration of best practices and ways to leverage technology through school-wide blogging and school-wide student/teacher/administrator digital media creation in their efforts to make learning irresistible.

Under Dr. Tyson's leadership, Mabry received Scholastic and Intel Corporation's prestigious Schools of Distinction Award for Technology Innovation. He set up MabryOnline.org, a collection of over 100 blogs which served as the school web presence and features students', teachers' and administrators' digital media creations, serving up over 1.5 million files a month to users all over the world. Educators from around the country and several foreign countries visited Mabry to see firsthand the innovative ways technology is used to maximize student achievement. This session will outline a philosophical framework, plus provide participants with concrete examples of how to build community, and engage staff and students in meaningful and creative ways.