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This year's COABE conference was a big success for Essential Education.  But, personally, it was a tough road to hoe for me.  As I drove into Pittsburgh, I got the news from my step-brother that our father had just passed away.  It wasn't sudden, but it was terrible timing (as if there is a good time to lose a parent). I decided on my own that 'the show must go on,' and I followed through with my duties at our exhibit and gave my presentations on disruptive innovations and the digital classroom.  But, I was a hollow shell of myself. If you met me at COABE, this is why I wasn't more gregarious.

Luckily, I didn't need to be a carnival barker to bring people to the table. They were beating a path straight to us so they could take home a free copy of our Extended Response writing workbook.  It's going to be a huge help to instructors looking for ways to teach writing skills beyond the old 5-paragraph essay model.  And after helping people search their souls for personal stories to tell, we have a big adjustment to make in focusing on evidence-based argumentation.  This book will help with that.  Did you miss us at COABE or did you miss the conference altogether?

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Essential Education probably gave away 600-700 copies of this 128 page workbook at COABE. The previous year, we gave away 800 copies of our 2014 GED Test Curriculum Blueprint.  We're really trying to help adult educators look at the biggest changes that impact their crucial roles of facilitating and mentoring and teaching.  The freebees are just the tip of the iceberg of all that we've got to offer.   We launched updates to GED Academy as well as new versions: TASC Acacemy and HiSET Academy.  And our workbooks apply to all three high school equivalency exams.

I don't know about the lasting value of the tote bags and other swag that is always given out at conferences. There are lots of ways to build a brand. Essential Education aims to build affinity with our fellow educators and earn your respect by providing the best possible resources.  On a less serious note, one of you COABE attendees was giving away a nasty flu or virus type sickness, because I brought it home and spent the next several days with a high fever, and each of my three small children and my wife all had a bout of that cold as I started to get better.  Definitely a conference to remember for me, albeit a little hazy. Looking forward to Denver in 2015.