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The Lunch Time Leader Podcast team welcomed Dr. Salvatore Menzo into our "studio" for our first face-to-face interview of the year. Dr. Menzo will be taking over as Superintendent of Wallingford, CT Public Schools On July 1, 2009.

Please Note: Due to an accidental pushing of a button on the mixer, the sound quality is a bit off on this episode. This should not reflect on the interview team, but on the button pusher...our teacher Mr. Bogush!

While the podcast is edited, the video of the interview below is not. Place your cursor over the lower left corner of the video to press play.

In this show the Lunch Time Leaders welcome Bobbie Borne into our virtual studio. Bobbie is a librarian at the Wallingford Public Library. You will hear Bobbie tell us how the library is making a smooth transition into the digital age by changing and transforming their goods and services to keep up with the demands of its 21st Century patrons.

James Farmer came into the Lunch Time Leaders virtual studio all the way from the Edublogs mansion in Australia. Currently, he’s CEO of Edublogs, the largest education blog host on the web, and co-founder of Incsub, the original WordPress MU development agency.

Please note--at one point our heating fans kicked in and the audio is a bit rough for a couple of minutes. It does get better!

The Lunch Time Leaders Podcast Team welcomes Dean Mantz into our virtual studio. Dean is a network coordinator from Sterling, Kansas and works with teachers and students to integrate technology into the curriculum. Dean also teaches a class on Technology Integration at Sterling College.

Kobus Van Wyk is the Program Manager for the Khanya Project in South Africa. The Khanya Project is responsible for helping integrate technology in over 1000 South African Schools.

This is our first interview of the year! It was done with skype--Kobus could not make it into the studio since he was 8000 miles away!

http://www.khanya.co.za/

http://www.khanya.co.za/blogs/index.php

Ginger Lewman is Director of the Face-to-Face program at the Turning Point Learning Center charter school in Emporia, Kansas. She talks to the Lunch Time Leaders about preparing students for the 21st Century, the challenges of starting a charter school, and what sparked her passion to become a progressive educator.

Dr Sharen McKay manages a lab at Yale University that does research into the role and mechanism of mitochondrial gene expression. She spent time with our podcast team discussing her research, and what skills are necessary to be a scientist in the 21st Century.

Image Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kevin813/

A team of eight students have been examining a script from the Young American Heroes Project on Frederick Douglas. They are going to send their suggestions to the production team when finished. Today they had the opportunity to interview Professor Alibrandi from Fairfield University who is working with the production company, Palace Production Center.

"Palace Production Center, an award-winning Connecticut media company is teaming with Fairfield University Graduate School of Education, CPTV, and a team of top historians from places like Yale University and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History to create a breakthrough multi-platform project to help teach history and civics to middle school students.

Called Young American Heroes (YAH), the project is one of only a handful funded last year by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in a national competition that drew 80 entries.

YAH seeks to set up a new paradigm for education...breaking down the walls...going directly to teachers to get their input...and finding students where they live 24/7 on their I-Pods and cell phones...speaking to them in peer based language. "

http://www.cpbn.org/young-american-heroes

The film is scheduled to be aired on National Public Television next year.

In this episode mayoral candidate James Vumbaco sits down with the podcast team to answer questions about educational issues.

We would love to hear your thoughts about the interview and any ideas for people we should interview in the future. Click on comments!