As the end of the school year creeps closer, it’s easy to lose sight of professional-development opportunities.

Conferences and webinars are simple ways to brush up on best practices, discover new methods to connect with students, network with other professionals and much more. Even better? Many professional-development events are free to attend!

As a gift to our educator community, we’ve put in the work and rounded up 24 spring conferences and webinars, from March to May. The majority of these opportunities are virtual and free, making professional development accessible for all.

Diversity in STEM has been a decades-long challenge for the United States workforce. As underrepresented communities gain access to more opportunities, however, diversity within STEM careers has grown - especially within the past decade.

Currently, women make up 35 percent of the STEM workforce. While there is still a lot of work to do to achieve true gender equality in the sector, the gap has shrunk significantly. For example, only 8 percent of STEM workers in 1970 were women, showing a big jump over the course of 50 years.

Having spent more than 30-weeks with their assigned new teachers, showing them the tricks of the trade and observing their lessons and interactions with students, mentors of our new teachers have concluded their new teaching colleagues had an awesome first year. They make it clear that it is possible for a new teacher to make an immediate impact right from the start of their teaching career or to establish themselves quickly as an impact teacher once they learn the teaching ropes from effective mentors like themselves.

Nothing beats free, and having a library card gives you free access to thousands of educational resources. A library card also opens up unique and diverse events that expand your horizons. During Black History Month, libraries are essential in making sure Black stories are heard.

Throughout New Jersey, libraries are showcasing Black authors, artists, storytellers and more - in person and virtually. Many of these events feature local New Jerseyans who have created history or are in the middle of creating history.

During my classes last February, we watched a video that highlights the book, Fugitive Pedagogy, written by Dr. Jarvis Givens, Assistant Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. The video provides an introduction to the term fugitive pedagogy coined by Dr. Givens which he defines as African-Americans' physical and intellectual acts that explicitly challenged antiblack protocols of educational domination; actions that often took place in discreet or partially concealed fashion. Dr. Jarvis' focus in the video is on the teacher and the textbook and how insurgent intellectuals use competing narratives of black life to offer a liberating educational experience in segregated black schools. Following the viewing, candidates in my classes, first-year teachers from diverse age groups and backgrounds, shared their impressions from the video. While their comments reflect a range of reactions, one commonality is that they each found the video compelling.