You’ve registered for the 2004-2005 iNet Online Conference series. You haven’t travelled anywhere and you haven’t checked into an expensive hotel. The usual conference crowd is nowhere to be seen. So how can this website on the Internet be a ‘conference’?

To answer this question, we need to subtract the usual sumptuous dinners, the stage at the front, and the presenters with their microphones from our thinking. Instead, we need to focus more closely on the meaning of the word ‘conference’. Most dictionaries will tell you that a conference is about ‘discussion’ and ‘consultation’. In this sense, online conferences are ‘super’ conferences.

First, there is no polite sitting on chairs for hours, listening passively to one-way lectures by a small number of visiting experts, with short question times tacked onto the end. The major benefit of an online conference is that it provides a sustained opportunity to be intellectually interactive with colleagues and experts on key professional issues.

This series of four online conferences will provide far more genuine two-way discussion and consultation with experts and colleagues than a traditional ‘real’ conference.

The 2004-5 iNet Online Conference series will eventually comprises more than 80 Focus and General Papers, on four themes that have been identified by Professor David Hargreaves as key to the education transformation agenda, in his book, ‘Personalising Learning: Next Steps in Working Laterally’. It is hoped that, through sharing knowledge, educators will gain access to a collective pool of wisdom on each of the four themes. At the end of the online conference, the knowledge shared will be brought together in the form of a publication.

Each of the online conferences will run for seven days only and include a wide range of papers to stimulate online discussion and debate. Each day, participants will have the opportunity to debate one of seven selected Focus Papers, as well as contribute to a further General Paper Online discussion on the entire range of papers published on the online conference website (it is anticipated that around 20 papers altogether will be published each time).

In an online conference, you are able to choose where, and when, you participate. You are able to choose the level of commitment you wish to make, and the time you are able to spend, given your other obligations. You may wish to reposition regular commitments to make time during the school day to participate. Alternatively, you may prefer to work on the online conference early in the morning, before the start of the working day, or after dinner in the evening. You might choose to participate from your computer at school, from your computer at home, or from a cybercafé anywhere on the planet (as has been done by online conference participants in the past).

Please refer to the Guidelines document that explains how to participate in this online conference.

Debra J. Brydon
Online Conference Manager
brydon@cybertext.net.au