Carol LaRow has taught language arts for the Niskayuna Central School District in upstate NY for over 30 years. She is an Apple Distinguished Educator, a Smithsonian Laureate, received WNYT’s Educator of Excellence Award, and was nominated for Disney’s American Teacher Award. She was inducted into the New York State Academy for Teaching and Learning by the New York State Education Department. Her work, which addresses the NYS Learning Standards, will be used as an exemplar for educators across New York State. She has been published by ISTE in the NETS Book for Educators. And, she has received numerous awards from the United States Navy, the House of Representatives, the NY State Senate, and the Schenectady County Legislature.
Carol has also been a master teacher of technology for the NY Wired Collaborative Grant and was responsible for training and mentoring teams of teachers. During the 2001-2002 school year, she was on "special assignment" from her district as a technology consultant to the Northeast Regional Information Center. She has written curriculum for Apple Computer, Inc. and was chosen from educators across the country to teach at the Apple Teacher Institutes, which were designed to enable teachers to use technology to maximize teaching and expand their expertise. She has mentored teachers taking Apple’s ASDO Courses, online. Carol has also written tutorials for ADOBE, Inc. and her bio appears on ADOBE's Go Live CD, which is a web page authoring application. She works with education managers at ADOBE as an educational advisor. She is a community leader for America Online, where she hosts teacher chats and moderates an educational technology board in the AOL@School Forum.
Carol has been a feature presenter at statewide conferences such as NYSCATE, NYSSBA, NYTalks, NYSUT/SED, SAANYS, NYSMSA, NYSEC, and CECA. She has also presented to the New York State Legislature and New York State United Teachers Headquarters, demonstrating how NYS educators integrate technology in their classrooms. She is a member of NYSCATE's Select Speakers' Bureau. Members of the Speakers' Bureau were chosen based on evaluations from NYSCATE “statewide” conference attendees. Carol was ranked in the top 10% of presenters at NYSCATE 2001.
She also does staff development at various school districts and presents keynote addresses and motivational speeches to faculties and administrators. Carol is proficient in both platforms - pc and Mac. In addition, she does technology presentations for Apple Computer, Inc. at statewide technology conferences, school districts, Apple technology updates, and legislative events. She has been invited to be a guest speaker for Microsoft Corp and works with their education managers. She teaches technology inservice courses for the Capital Region Teacher Center and the Model Schools Collaboration. She is a member of the Niskayuna School District’s K-12 technology CORE team and was the original WEB master for Van Antwerp Middle School, designing and maintaining the school’s WEB page. She maintains a classroom web page with her students.