" For whatever it's worth: One of the participants reports that they've been in classes for 13 hours a day and have hours of homework to do each night."

Why are you making excuses, no one is saying that the event is not worth while. I would hope that the time spent would be rigorous especially since Harvard is sponsoring the conference. The issue here is that there is a ban on travel regardless of the worthiness of the conference; the issue is that these people should not be in Cambridge, MA on the school systems dime as there is no travel allowed by the school system.

Rules mean nothing then especially if those who make the rules and enforce the rules break the rules. Is this the ethical example that we should be setting to the children of BCPSS that we lead and teach?

So the school system spent close to $19,000.00 for these people to go. In these tight times is there a school that could have used that $19,000.00 to help with the cost of supplies or a teacher. The ban was put in place so that these resources could be refocused to students and classrooms. I am sure that there are several principals that could have used all or at least a portion of that $19,000.00 plus dollars in his or her school budget.

Could you find out if the union paid for the union representative and did the mayor's office pay for the representative from her office or is the school system now paying for people who don't even work for them to travel - further stretching the limits of a CEO imposed travel ban. I would hope that the union and the mayor’s office paid their portion of the conference registration and also all of their travel costs.

Did the travel costs for Mr. Hornbeck come from his school's budget - he is after all the principal of a charter school, Hampstead Hill Academy. I understand that the school system provides those schools with larger amounts of money to cover their operating budgets as ordered by the courts and so I would assume then that this charter school operating outside of the school system’s rules and regulations to have picked up the travel costs for their leader to participate in this conference. Yet another non school system person traveling on the school system’s dime – when will this hypocrisy end.

It seems to me that one should wait to hear how the trip was budgeted before criticizing.

I know, for example, that my school this past week had teachers out of state at training. I do not know if it was put in before the edict about out-of-state travel came down (like, perhaps, the above described), or perhaps that it's out of a different budget. I don't know, so I'm not going to criticize.

In any case, the banning of out-of-state travel for training and conferences is a sad development for the Baltimore City Public Schools. I have gotten so much out of attending the various conferences in my career, and then brought ideas back to my schools. This is particularly important with the dearth of quality professional development in the system. The sharing of ideas, best practices and current research in education is crucial.

I am giving Alonso the benefit of the doubt at this point about this travel right now, though, because I don't know all the details. If, in fact, he did go ahead and decide that his proclamation only applied to others and not himself, then I'll be very disappointed. I hope this comes to light either way.

Yes, God forbid that our school system should participate in the level of learning that takes place at events like this. I don't remember the decision to stop traveling and if in deed one was made and the system picked up the travel costs than this is bad form. Having said that, it's about time that a team of people of this caliber should sit together and actually work together to figure out new ways of doing things. This has been one of the more dysfunctional systems with a serious lack of learning at the top ranks. I applaud Alonso and his drive for a more educated top level and the fact this wasn't some junket to Atlantic City such as has been the practice of the Union where nothing is learned except how to spend union dues. I only hope that the team brings the things back to the school level and that this then gets pushed down to the teacher level.

I was was honored to present a workshop at the American Association of School Librarians' (AASL) conference last October in Nevada -- I presented original research conducted with data provided by Maryland school systems, and I believe I am the only BCPSS school librarian to have been selected to present at that national conference.

I learned many valuable things at the conference that I am still working to implement at my school, and I paid my own way to attend. National conferences are one of the best ways to provide high-quality professional development, and the benefits can far outweigh their pricetag, as well as encouraging teachers to engage in leadership and data-driven research that benefits teachers and children.

I was a presenter at AASL, not just an attendee, and I still had to pay my own way.

(1) Where was out-of-state travel banned? I couldn't find it in Open Access for the board policies. I'd imagine this is a policy thing, thus determined by the Board & not the CEO.

(2) You mean sending every school's BTU representative to Atlantic City for a weekend and footing the bill with other teachers' hard-earned money (taken without consent) is not a good allocation of funds for a union? If you can't spend thousands on over-the-top board meetings, then what are unions good for?

Bill, don't be naive. You know that all bans aren't open access, just 'strongly forwned upon'. And when did you become so sarcastic and rhetorical? WheW!