ITEC Fall Conference 2026

I started teaching 5th grade in the 1900s. 💾 I’ve always been a geek for tech, so I maxed out my credit card to buy a laptop my first year of teaching. Laptops were very, very expensive back then, and schools did not supply them.

I loved what I could create for my fifth graders with that laptop. But I wanted my students to have that same joy of learning by creating. While we could march down to the computer lab (if there wasn’t already a class scheduled), in 2001 my district purchased Palm Pilots with keyboards for each of my students. We did amazing things with those tiny handheld devices.

Over the years, the tech has changed, but my love for seeing students as creators, communicators, collaborators, and thinkers has not. Today, I help teachers find that same joy of creating and exploring with technology. I serve as an AI Coordinator for Council Bluffs Community School District and travel nationally as a presenter and workshop leader.