More About Dr. Petner
Dr. Joe Petner is Education Program Director, Adjunct Faculty at Lesley University, Wheelock College, and the Boston Teacher Residency Program at the University of Massachusetts Boston. He also serves as Support Facilitator for the District and School Assistance Center, at the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and 
Secondary Education. He has worked in public education for over 40 years. As Principal of the Haggerty Elementary School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he was involved in building a new school facility and the development of a whole school model of inclusion. Dr. Petner collaborated with filmmaker Dan Habib on his award-winning documentary Including Samuel.
He began his career in teaching in 1967 in the Philadelphia Public Schools. He earned a doctorate from the University of North Dakota's Center for Teaching and Learning in 1974. He served as a liaison to the Fort Yates School located on Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota in support of the school's implementation of the Follow Though Program, a sequel to Head Start. Joe joined the Cambridge Public Schools in 1974 as a staff and program developer for its Follow Through Program under the instructional sponsorship of Bank Street College in New York. He was director of the Cambridge Follow Through Program from 1979-1989.
In 1989 he became Principal of the Haggerty Elementary School, a position he retired from in July 2007. As an early childhood educator, he has served on the Cambridge Council for Children, the Cambridge Early Childhood Council, and the Kindergarten Entry Age Task Force.
Dr. Petner is currently working with the MA Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education in the role of a support facilitator with the District and School Assistance Center in the Greater Boston Region. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Federation for Children with Special Needs and is an Intergenerational Math Tutor for the Cambridge School Volunteers.
More About Dr. Henderson
Dr. William W. Henderson was an educator in the Boston Public Schools for 36 years. In 1989, he was appointed principal of the Patrick O'Hearn Elementary School with a mandate to develop an inclusive program, and he remained its leader for 20 years. 
The school gained widespread recognition for inclusion, academic progress, arts, technology, and family involvement.
Upon his retirement from the Boston Public Schools in June 2009, the O'Hearn was renamed the Dr. William W. Henderson Inclusion School. Dr. Henderson holds a bachelor's degree from Yale University, a master's from Goddard College, and a doctorate of education from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Since retiring from the Boston Public Schools, he continues to present at universities and conferences, and he serves as a consultant for school systems and agencies.
Dr. Henderson started in 1973 as a middle school teacher and later served as a staff trainer and curriculum developer before becoming an assistant principal at a K-8 School. In 1989, he was appointed principal of the Patrick O'Hearn Elementary School. Bill earned a B.A. from Yale University, an M. A. from Goddard College, and an Ed.D. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
In 2011, Harvard Education Press published his book, "The Blind Advantage: How Going Blind Made me a Stronger Principal and how Including Children with Disabilities Made the School Better for Everyone."
