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Free online lectures: Explore a world of ideas

Funding provided by:

Harvard Graduate School of Education

The Askwith Education Forum, at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, is endowed through the generosity of Patricia Askwith Kenner and other members of the Askwith family, and acts as a galvanizing force for debate and conversation about education in its narrowest and broadest perspectives. Each year, the Forum welcomes a number of prominent people from diverse fields to speak about issues relevant to education and children. Recent topics have included immigration, values, affirmative action, education reform, and the arts. All of these events are free and open to the public.break

http://www.gse.harvard.edu/askwith

Answering Only to God: Faith and Freedom in Iran

Tue, Apr 15, 2003

Jonathan Lyons discusses his book Answering Only to God: Faith and Freedom in Twenty-First-Century Iran.

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Language Police: Restricting What We learn

Tue, May 6, 2003

Diane Ravitch discusses her latest book The Language Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn. Ravitch maintains that America's students are compelled to read texts that have been censored by publishers who willingly cut controversial material from their books. Her book documents the existence of an elaborate and well established protocol of beneficent censorship, quietly endorsed and implemented by test makers and textbook publishers, states, and the federal government. School boards and sensitivity committees review, abridge, and modify texts to delete potentially offensive words, topics, and imagery. Publishers practice self-censorship to sell books in big states.

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Yes We Can: Closing the Achievement Gaps

Tue, Mar 10, 2009

The authors of three recent books address how closing racial achievement gaps is indeed possible.

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Stanley Kaplan: Democratizing American Achievement

Tue, Apr 23, 2002

Stanley Kaplan discusses how the knowledge and skills to triumph in education can be taught to any and all students.

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Keeping Hope Alive: New Era of Youth Civic Engagement

Wed, Feb 25, 2009

Thinkers and practitioners from the worlds of research, policy, media and technology, politics, youth organizing, and schools discuss the causes and consequences of recent trends in youth civic engagement. The panel considers how youth can become further civically engaged and empowered. As we enter a new era of civic opportunity, this is the ideal time to reflect on how young people's increasing civic awareness and involvement can be further nurtured and fostered. At the same time, we must also consider how the circle of civic engagement can be expanded to include those youth who currently remain disengaged and/or disempowered. To these ends, Askwith Education Forum participants discuss such issues as who is involved (e.g. college-educated vs. other youth), how youth get involved (e.g. school vs. youth organizing vs. technology-mediated opportunities), and what the implications are for the future of youth civic empowerment. Speakers include: Peter Levine, director of the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE); Joe Kahne, professor of education at Mills College; and Miriam Martinez, youth education council director for the Mikva Challenge. Howard Gardner, professor of cognition and education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, introduces and moderates the forum. This forum is co-sponsored with the Civic and Moral Education Initiative at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

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Meet the Poet: Billy Collins

Thu, Dec 12, 2002

In this intimate discussion, Billy Collins shares his thoughts on poetry as well as select readings from his works.

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Privatization and the Public Good?

Wed, Dec 4, 2002

Martha Minow, Harvard Law School professor, discusses her book, *Partners, Not Rivals: Privatization and the Public Good*, and explores what happens when private companies, nonprofit agencies, and religious groups, instead of government, manage education, criminal justice, legal services, and welfare programs. She is joined by John F. Kennedy School of Government faculty member Mark Moore, director of the Hauser Center for Non-Profit Organizations, and the Daniel and Florence Guggenheim Professor of Criminal Justice Policy and Public Management. Gary Orfield, Harvard Graduate School of Education, professor of education and social policy, introduces these distinguished guests. This event was co-sponsored by the Harvard Children's Initiative.

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Communities of Color Moving Forward

Fri, Mar 3, 2006

Panelists discuss how they understand and define catastrophe in the context of communities of color. They ask whether catastrophe is a one-time, horrific event that changes a community's daily life or a long-range series of events that consistently undermine a community ability to pursue goals. Is a catastrophic event generated by natural occurrences or human action? Attention is specifically focused on events affecting individuals and communities of color and a community's ability to drive the education of its members.

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How Public Schools Meet the Nation's Changing Needs

Wed, May 10, 2006

Patricia Albjerg Graham, Charles Warren Research Professor of the History of American Education, discusses her her recent book, Schooling America. Drawing on a wide array of sources, Graham illustrates Americans' changing demands for our schools and colleges, and how these institutions have responded by providing what critics want, though never as completely or as quickly as they would like. Learn about the passionate educators, scholars and journalists who drove particular agendas, and Graham's own family, starting with her immigrant father's first day of school and moving through her experiences as a teacher. Invaluable background in the ongoing debate on education in the United States, her book offers an insightful look at what the public has sought from its educational institutions, what educators have delivered, and what remains to be done. She is introduced by Richard Murnane, Academic Dean and Juliana W. and William Foss Thompson Professor of Education and Society.

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School District Reform: Leadership in Uncertain Times

Mon, Apr 24, 2006

This panel, moderated by Robert Peterkin, Francis Keppel Professor of Educational Policy and Administration and director of the Urban Superintendents Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, gives Tom Payzant and Arlene Ackerman, two outstanding Superintendents, an opportunity to share their experiences and reflect on how to improve some of our most challenging districts. Both Tom Payzant and Arlene Ackerman have proven that a superintendent committed to a theory of action can make a difference in some of our nation's most complex districts. Both Payzant and Ackerman have also shattered the "urban myth" that large city superintendents only remain in office for less than three years. Payzant's 10-year tenure in Boston and Ackerman's six-year tenure in San Francisco have been characterized by real change focused on improving teaching and learning in schools. Both superintendents have demonstrated that it is possible to adopt a plan for reform and find the needed talent, resources, and support to make it happen.

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