Author, education exec to speak in Batesville

Tom Vander Ark, chief executive officer of Getting Smart and former first executive director for education with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will provide the keynote address at the Forward Thinking Conference this week at the University of Arkansas Community College in Batesville.

Forward Arkansas, a partnership between the Arkansas Board of Education, the Walton Family Foundation and the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, is hosting the conference Thursday and Friday.

People in the five communities recently designated as Forward Arkansas communities will have an opportunity to share best practices and receive advice from Vander Ark and other leaders in the education field. The five communities are Independence County, Crossett, Marianna, Pea Ridge and Springdale.

Vander Ark wrote the book Smart Cities That Work for Everyone: 7 Keys to Education & Employment.

“Learning is everyone’s job; families, neighborhoods, schools and cities,” said Vander Ark in a news release. “While livability, workability and sustainability have come to be recognized as the basis of a sound community, we’ve come to realize that learnability should also be considered, and we’re impressed to see that mindset in ForwARd Arkansas’s five identified communities.”

Other partnering organizations presenting at the conference include the Clinton School of Public Service, Dolly Parton Imagination Library, EAST Initiative, New Tech Network and UATeach-STEM Teacher Prep Program.

Britton Harmon, a robotic welder and graduate of the community college in Batesville, will also be a presenter at the conference and talk about the impact of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, instruction on his career choice.

More information on the Forward conference is available at ForwARdArkansas.org.