If you’re a science educator or administrator, NSTA’s Conference on Science Education in Phoenix, scheduled for Dec. 3–5, is an event you won’t want to miss. With a new interest in science education to better prepare our children to compete in the global market, educators will need to pursue the best professional development to bolster content knowledge, learn assessment and inquiry strategies, and test the newest classroom tools and techniques. Featuring more than 400 sessions, workshops, presentations, and symposia, the conference is for teachers in every grade band and from every discipline.

• Daylong programs—Biology Day, Chemistry Day, Physical Science Day, and Physics Day.
• Activities from Across the Earth System—Hands-on, inquiry-based activities spanning the five "spheres" of Earth system science. Handouts! (Elem–High School)
• The School Water Audit Project: Authentic and Integrative Project-based Learning-engages learners in science, literacy, and mathematics to determine the amount of water used in their school and to implement conservation. (Elem–High School)
• Facing the Future—Explore sustainability issues and the incorporation of literacy in the science classroom through hands-on, inquiry-based activities. CD-ROM provided.
• Ice Core Records: From Volcanoes to Stars—Use absolute and relative dating techniques with high-resolution ice core data and historic volcanic eruptions to correlate and date supernova events from nitrate anomalies. (High–College, Informal Educators)
• Ira Flatow (Host, NPR's Science Friday®): Talking Science in a Science-Challenged World—Mixing Flatow’s passion for science with a tendency toward being "a bit of a ham," Flatow describes his work as the challenge “to make science and technology a topic for discussion around the dinner table.”
• Lost Dutchman State Park Moonlight Hike—Located in the Sonoran Desert 40 miles east of Phoenix, the park derives its name from the fabled Lost Dutchman Mine. (Ticketed)
• Networking with your peers and the experts
• The Exhibition Hall—Bring a tote to carry home the many giveaways from top companies.

And there is much more to explore. Visit www.nsta.org/phoenix to get details or to register.