We have been back in the Chicago area this week with Sky Dome Planetarium, our portable planetarium school assembly, presented in schools there by the exceptional Rojo. He just appeared at a school in Joliet, Illinois, and judging by the reaction I think they liked him!

Last week we had an adventure, of sorts, here in our office. We began to hear strange noises emanating from an interior wall in the back room where we store unused equipment from our school assemblies. Hmmm.

I just listened to an amazing piece and I want to share it with you. Our kids today are so much more internet savvy than I am. Of course, when I was that age we did not have the internet. When I was a kid we were still writing with quill pens!

If you read this blog often you will know I listen to NPR a lot. Today was no exception. At lunchtime I was out to pick up a sandwich and got stuck listening to a pair of interviews on Fresh Air with Terry Gross that concerned education in the United States. The first was a fascinating interview with former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch, explaining what changed her mind on No Child Left Behind, school vouchers and charter schools. 

OK, this is purely fatherly pride. This has nothing to do with school assemblies or science assembly programs, but only with a dad and a daughter and a father's pride. Mea culpa. It's my daughter. Guilty as charged!

Once again a science assembly from Mobile Ed is in the news! Robert Pirtle, noted for his great school assemblies through out the Midwest and in Texas, is currently out East and making headline stories! His super science assembly The Magic of Science was recently in Utica, New York at Martin Luther King Elementary. Reporters from WKTV were there to cover the story.

Ohio is just across the line from our home state of Michigan so, of course, a lot of our school assemblies appear at Ohio schools throughout the year. Every so often we will encounter a reporter at a school, either from a newspaper or a television station, and we are always happy to see them. Sadly, by the time the article appears in print we are usually gone from the area and so we seldom see our own publicity.
Recently, however, one of our school assembly presenters was in a southern Ohio school to present our television production school assembly program - “Lights Camera Action”. Derek McDonald, one of the gentlemen who presents that show was visiting at the Bishop Flaget school in Chillicothe, Ohio. He found himself speaking with David Berman, a reporter from the Chillicothe Gazette. Well David wrote a nice little piece about the program which you can read here:
http://www.chillicothegazette.com/article/20110303/NEWS01/103030301/-1/7daysarchives/Bishop-Flaget-students-get-hands-chance-video-production
We are very proud of Derek. Derek hails from the great state of Tennessee and has been performing school assemblies in schools throughout the midwest for us for many years. He has many fans in schools in Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin. Derek also presents our Character Counts school assembly “Inspector Iwannano”, and does a really great job. The great news is that next year Derek will also take on two of our other programs (two of our absolute best!), “Sky Dome Planetarium” and “The Earth Dome” (AKA Earth Balloon). We are certain he will bring great professionalism and flair to these fine school assemblies. The bad news is that next year Derek will spend very little time in the midwest schools where he has performed for so many years. Schools in Ohio, Michigan and Kentucky will have to fight over a small number of dates in September and January, as Derek will spend much of the 2011-2012 school year on the East coast visiting our client schools in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, New England and throughout the area around DC, Maryland and Virginia. So bad news for midwest schools but great news for schools on the East coast.
Regardless of where you are, whether your school is in Ohio or New York, Michigan or Virginia, the great school assemblies presented by Derek will provide an awesome experience for your school. He is a champion school assembly performer and we hope you will bring him to your school next year!