More than 1,000 Day School Leaders to Convene for 2013 North American Jewish Day School Conference Jewish lay and professional day school leaders from across the globe will gather in Washington, D.C. on February 3 – 5, for the fourth annual North American Jewish Day School Conference. The theme for the 2013 conference, “Learning to Lead–Leading to Learn,” highlights the importance of visionary leadership and network weaving for ensuring the vibrancy and value of Jewish day school education, now and into the future. Since its inception the conference has challenged influencers from across the Jewish spectrum to work together on ideas, initiatives and educational solutions that serve to positively transform the day school landscape into a field-wide network of stakeholders. More than 100 learning sessions and workshops designed to challenge, support and engage participants will be led by respected thought leaders –from the opening plenary by Deborah Frieze, author of Walk Out, Walk On and large-scale change facilitator Tim Merry to the concluding keynote address by Tony Wagner, the first Innovation Education Fellow at the Technology and Entrepreneurship Center at Harvard University and bestselling author of Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World and The Global Achievement Gap. An enhanced networking approach, designed with experts from Weave the People, and an Open Networking Lounge, inviting colleagues with shared interests to connect for professional collaboration, will foster meaningful conversations and relationships before, during and after the conference. A featured Monday afternoon plenary session on government advocacy and day schools brings together Jewish advocates Nathan J. Diament, executive director of public policy for the Orthodox Union; Melissa Rogers, director of Wake Forest University’s Center for Religion and Public Affairs; and Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center on Reform Judaism. The passionate and varied opinions government advocacy elicits will challenge leaders to foster understanding and seek common ground, which is a theme the conference has been building upon since its inception.  The North American Jewish Day School Conference is jointly planned and sponsored by RAVSAK: The Jewish Community Day School Network, the Institute for University-School Partnership at Yeshiva University, the Schechter Day School Network, PARDES Day Schools of Reform Judaism, and PEJE, the Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education.