Session History
Part of understanding the value of the "Future Is Now" session is to understand its history and growth. In 2010, the late Janice Suppa-Friedman, a member of NCTE’s Standing Committee on Affiliates, encouraged teacher educators to invite their pre-service teachers to participate in an NCTE Annual Convention session entitled "Aspiring and Early Career Teachers Share Their Ideas on How Teachers and Students Lead Literate Lives." Two teacher educators, Alan Brown and Patricia Waters, participated in that session in Orlando, Florida, which included twelve students and six roundtable presentations. An audience of approximately eleven people showed up to hear the students' presentations that day.
In 2011, the session expanded as five teacher educators (Alan Brown, Joan Mitchell, Bonnie Sunstein, Patricia Waters, and Amie Wortman Ohlmann) from four universities accepted an invitation to collaborate in a student affiliate session that would bring aspiring and early career teachers to the NCTE Annual Convention in Chicago, IL, to present in a session entitled “Embracing the Future with the Top Ten Teaching Ideas.” Sixteen students presented their teaching ideas that year to the delight of a small audience.
In 2012, as members of the leadership team for CEE-Graduate Strand (CEE-GS), now known as ELATE Graduate Strand, Luke Rodesiler and Alan Brown helped to organize a similar roundtable session at the NCTE Annual Convention dedicated to promoting the work of doctoral students in English education. That session for doctoral students has been organized annually by standing members of the ELATE Graduate Strand leadership team since 2012. That same year in Las Vegas, Nevada, Alan asked Luke to join him in resurrecting the session Janice Suppa-Friedman and others envisioned prior to her retirement and to grow it with the support of ELATE Graduate Strand. The goal would be for current ELATE Graduate Strand members and supporters to serve as session respondents not only to provide feedback for student presenters but also, and most importantly, to become cheerleaders for them as they started their professional careers.
Alan Brown and Luke Rodesiler have organized the “Future Is Now” session since 2013. In that time, the session has grown from...
At its height in 2019, the “Future Is Now” session brought together more than 250 NCTE attendees and included 38 tables and 115 presentations featuring 125 university students from 43 colleges and universities across the United States.
In 2020 and 2021, the "Future Is Now: Underground" session ran concurrently with the NCTE Virtual Annual Convention due to the COVID-19 pandemic and included a total of 123 virtual presentations. Luke and Alan wrote about this experience in an article for English Leadership Quarterly called "Online and Underground: Reconceptualizing a Professional Learning Experience in Times of Change."
At the most recent NCTE Annual Convention in 2023, the “Future Is Now” session drew a crowd of 165 attendees in a Sunday morning time slot. The session included 22 tables and 65 student presentations featuring 77 pre-service and beginning teachers from 32 colleges and universities across the country. A majority of the student presenters were first-time conference attendees.
Click here to learn more about the life of Janice Suppa-Friedman, a longtime NCTE member, advocate for pre-service teachers within NCTE, and middle school English teacher, reading specialist, and department chair for more than two decades in Prince William County, VA. Her legacy lives on through this annual NCTE session.
Part of understanding the value of the "Future Is Now" session is to understand its history and growth. In 2010, the late Janice Suppa-Friedman, a member of NCTE’s Standing Committee on Affiliates, encouraged teacher educators to invite their pre-service teachers to participate in an NCTE Annual Convention session entitled "Aspiring and Early Career Teachers Share Their Ideas on How Teachers and Students Lead Literate Lives." Two teacher educators, Alan Brown and Patricia Waters, participated in that session in Orlando, Florida, which included twelve students and six roundtable presentations. An audience of approximately eleven people showed up to hear the students' presentations that day.
In 2011, the session expanded as five teacher educators (Alan Brown, Joan Mitchell, Bonnie Sunstein, Patricia Waters, and Amie Wortman Ohlmann) from four universities accepted an invitation to collaborate in a student affiliate session that would bring aspiring and early career teachers to the NCTE Annual Convention in Chicago, IL, to present in a session entitled “Embracing the Future with the Top Ten Teaching Ideas.” Sixteen students presented their teaching ideas that year to the delight of a small audience.
In 2012, as members of the leadership team for CEE-Graduate Strand (CEE-GS), now known as ELATE Graduate Strand, Luke Rodesiler and Alan Brown helped to organize a similar roundtable session at the NCTE Annual Convention dedicated to promoting the work of doctoral students in English education. That session for doctoral students has been organized annually by standing members of the ELATE Graduate Strand leadership team since 2012. That same year in Las Vegas, Nevada, Alan asked Luke to join him in resurrecting the session Janice Suppa-Friedman and others envisioned prior to her retirement and to grow it with the support of ELATE Graduate Strand. The goal would be for current ELATE Graduate Strand members and supporters to serve as session respondents not only to provide feedback for student presenters but also, and most importantly, to become cheerleaders for them as they started their professional careers.
Alan Brown and Luke Rodesiler have organized the “Future Is Now” session since 2013. In that time, the session has grown from...
- From 14 universities to a high of 48 universities
- From 16 teacher educators to a high of 54 teacher educators
- From 32 student presenters to a high of 125 student presenters
- From 18 respondents to a high of 72 respondents
At its height in 2019, the “Future Is Now” session brought together more than 250 NCTE attendees and included 38 tables and 115 presentations featuring 125 university students from 43 colleges and universities across the United States.
In 2020 and 2021, the "Future Is Now: Underground" session ran concurrently with the NCTE Virtual Annual Convention due to the COVID-19 pandemic and included a total of 123 virtual presentations. Luke and Alan wrote about this experience in an article for English Leadership Quarterly called "Online and Underground: Reconceptualizing a Professional Learning Experience in Times of Change."
At the most recent NCTE Annual Convention in 2023, the “Future Is Now” session drew a crowd of 165 attendees in a Sunday morning time slot. The session included 22 tables and 65 student presentations featuring 77 pre-service and beginning teachers from 32 colleges and universities across the country. A majority of the student presenters were first-time conference attendees.
Click here to learn more about the life of Janice Suppa-Friedman, a longtime NCTE member, advocate for pre-service teachers within NCTE, and middle school English teacher, reading specialist, and department chair for more than two decades in Prince William County, VA. Her legacy lives on through this annual NCTE session.
