PRESENTING
The 2023 Early Childhood Early Childhood Conference. Join Early Educators from across Indiana at the Early Childhood Conference in Indianapolis. This two-day conference provides you the opportunity to earn continuing education hours while learning from industry leaders.
Keynote Speakers
Rosemarie Allen, Ph.D.
Rosemarie Allen has served as a leader in early childhood education for nearly 40 years. Her life’s work is centered on ensuring children have access to high-quality early childhood programs that are developmentally and culturally appropriate. She is currently an Associate Professor in the School of Education at the Metropolitan State University of Denver. Her classes are focused on ensuring teachers are aware of how issues of equity, privilege, and power impact teaching practices. Rosemarie has served in directorship roles with the Colorado Department of Human Services where she was responsible for the State’s child care licensing program, the federal child care assistance program, the redesign of the State’s quality rating and improvement system, the implementation of the State’s professional development plan, and assisted in the creation of Colorado’s early learning guidelines. Rosemarie is a respected keynote speaker and has the distinct honor of being appointed as a “Global Leader” to represent the United States at World Conferences across the globe.
Dr. Allen’s non-profit Institute for Racial Equity & Excellence (IREE) serves as the lead agency for ensuring equity in educational practices throughout the nation. IREE monitors and licenses child care centers using a model she created, “Culturally Responsive Community-Based Licensing”. Rosemarie also served on President Obama’s “My Brother’s Keeper” (MBK) initiative, Early Childhood Task Force. In that role, she was the national expert on implicit bias and culturally responsive practices, speaking at conferences across the country. She also serves as a contractor for the National Center for Pyramid Model Innovations focusing on equity, implicit bias, and culturally responsive practices in the Pyramid Model for Supporting Social Emotional Competence in Infants and Young Children.
Rosemarie earned her B. A. from California State University, Master’s of Education from Lesley University, and a Doctorate Degree in Leadership for Equity in Education from the University of Colorado, Denver.
Mike Longoria, Ph.D. aka Dr. Mike!
Mike Longoria, a.k.a. Dr. Mike!, has a Ph.D. in early childhood education and has over 30 years of early childhood experience in the capacity as a Pre-K, kindergarten, and special education teacher, Head Start administrator, university professor, independent consultant, and curriculum developer.
Dr. Mike has keynoted state and national early childhood conferences and has conducted professional development for PreK and kindergarten teachers across 25 states. Teachers leave his trainings with a better understanding on how music and movement engages the brain and brings JOY to education! Furthermore, this joyful approach to learning meets the needs of ALL students.
In addition to conducting keynotes and professional development, Dr. Mike creates multimodal early literacy resources that develop oral language, vocabulary, literacy skills through music and movement. His multimodal resources, “Sing to Read” and “Sing and Sign” are being implemented across the country and are also available in Spanish.
As an early childhood teacher, university professor and curriculum developer, Dr. Mike believes that “Music and movement touch our emotions, emotions get our attention, and attention leads to learning” (Dr. Mike 2017).