[staff] A Time of Conferences
Within the last month I have been to several conferences, both through work and on my own time. The first conference I went to was held in Philadelphia and was a working conference that looked at the taxonomy of virtual worlds. This conference had many different virtual world platform developers, researchers, and educators using virtual worlds, among others, who were present. The topic surrounded the different roles that virtual worlds should play, especially within educational environments. I went to this conference with a colleague and we were honored to be accompanied by two GK youth, who were invited so as to incorporate the youth voice into the conference. The two youth who accompanied us were amazing. They carried themselves with poise and interacted well with all of the other attendees throughout the entire conference.
The second conference I went to was actually only one evening for a few hours and perhaps would be better classified as a discussion, but the important point that I would like to highlight was the fact that it was not youth-oriented. It covered global security, specifically looking at how certain events affect the United States. The entire evening was prepared by and geared towards adults, without any concept of youth being integrated into the discussion. The third conference I attended was the annual GK conference, which some of you may already know. The annual conference is developed and led by GK leaders, who are involved with GK programs, for other youth who are from around New York. The outcome of the conference was great – it was nice to see a place where youth came together from all over New York to discuss different global issues – in this case global health – and hear all the different voices, which in most cases, would be silenced in an adult-oriented conference.
I think it is challenging to not only create, but also maintain a youth-friendly environment at a conference, when most of the occupants are adults. After my multitude of conference events, I saw the value that youth added to the conferences. Youth have so much to say, bringing a fresh outlook and new ideas to an environment that in most cases concerns them. They should not be excluded from matters that affect them so directly. The youth who contributed at the conference in Philadelphia brought with them their experience on a topic that was looking at education within virtual worlds, something both are intricately involved with. Their voice, assuming it was heard, will make the outcome of such a conference that much stronger and incorporating their voice is something that more event organizers should strive to do.
