Whose Children Are They?

Thanks to Bert Roebben for the announcement of this new book — Educating Religious Education Teachers: Perspectives of International Knowledge Transfer — which is open access and free for download!

Check out our announcements page, and particularly the resource links collection. People have started add things to both of those sites. You can, too!

Also, remember to prepare for the Business Meeting later today. As an association we are very participatory and collegial, and at that time we make decisions together that impact our work for years to come.

REA2023 is off to a great start! Packed sessions yesterday, with ideas percolating amongst people engaging with papers. Remember that papers are linked to each session, and we encourage you to read them ahead of time so that the discussion is as rich as possible in the synchronous gatherings. Zoom links for sessions will be available on the schedule 15 minutes ahead of the scheduled start time.

You can find resources and other information that is being shared at our announcements page — please add your own! We are using padlet to do this, so anyone can add their reflections, ideas, announcements of new books and openings, and so much more.

Check it out!

The REA is a participatory, collaborative association and every year at our business meeting we take a number of actions that are crucial to the REA’s work, among them approving a budget, electing new board and committee members, and so on. If you are new to the association, come to our welcome reception on Tuesday to learn more, and note that our business meeting will take place on Wednesday.

Please take some time to read over the various materials on our business meeting page. If you want to run for an office, note that we do accept nominations from the floor.

Please also keep an eye on our announcements padlet, for as the week goes on we may add materials there for you to use in preparation.

…and there’s a lot to savor this year! Over 30 sessions across five days and a whole bunch of timezones. Research that covers early childhood through adulthood, all from the perspective of what paying close attention to childhood and adolescence might teach us about the work of religious education. Viewpoints that reflect diverse contexts, traditions, values, and goals. It’s going to be an amazing smorgasbord of papers, presentations, panels, and participant conversations

This year’s plenary panels blend familiar and new voices. Newcomers include:

• Christine Diindiisi McCleave, Indigenous scholar, activist, and enrolled citizen of the Turtle Mountain Ojibwe Nation
• Henry Zonio, sociologist and member of the Equity Audit team for the Godly Play Foundation
• Ramona Grad, professor of psychology and counseling at the University of Texas at Tyler
• Japjit Kaur Pnaiser, Sikh early years educator in the UK
• Jen Mata McMahon, University of Maryland professor of early childhood education with a special interest in bilingual education
• Duaa Haggag, community educator and psychotherapist working with Muslim families in the Twin Cities
• Aaron Weininger, senior rabbi of Adath Jeshurum Congregation in Minnetonka, Minnesota
• Elaine Champagne, Religion, Spirituality and Health Chair in the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies at Université Laval (Canada)
• Elsa Lau, teaching ethics, spirituality, and education in Hong Kong
• Mubina Hassanali Kirmani, award-winning children’s book author and recently retired professor of education from Towson University

They are joined by REA members Annie Lockhart-Gilroy (womanist Christian educator and associate professor at Phillips Theological Seminary), Carmichael Crutchfield (professor at Memphis Theological Seminary and General Secretary of the Department of Christian Education and Formation for the CME Church), Brad Wigger (professor of religious education and childhood studies at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary), and Michael Shire (rabbi and professor of Jewish education at Hebrew College).

It’s not too late to pull up a chair and join the feast! Check out all the goodies the REA2023 Schedule has to offer. The table is set and ready for you to dish a bunch of tasty sessions onto your plate!

July 10 is fast approaching! We are excited about our meeting, and looking forward to welcoming everyone.

Here is a pre-conference checklist: 

• Come to the meeting for free by joining or renewing your membership. You can do that on the schedule or at the membership page.
• Read the pre-conference issue of our journal.
• Nominate someone who has never been to REA before for a free trial membership. The link to nominate is at thebottom of the schedule once you are logged in. Doing so means they will have access to the annual meeting and one year of digital access to our journal. 
• Select the sessions you would like to attend and start to build your conference schedule.
• Read the research interest group papers for the sessions you choose by clicking on the session in the schedule, and then on the link within the description. You must be logged in to access the papers.
• We will be offering live translation of the plenary sessions in Korean and in Spanish this year, so please encourage people for whom these languages will be encouraging, to join us.
• Given that we are online, we are asking people to share announcements —including short lightning talks — via padlet. You can put an announcement here, including a link to any video or other resource you want to share.
• Finally, we ask that you read through the draft “code of conduct” which our JEDI officer, Dr. Christine Hong, and the Advisory Council have been working on. It is a standard agreement towards just and equitable practices, and we believe will support our collaboration across so many differing global contexts.

Chuck Chesnavage and Maureen O’Brien have posted details of the upcoming Catholic Community of Practice meeting, which will take place on Monday, July 10th starting at 9:15 pm eastern.