Perhaps you’ve noticed that I’ve been writing fewer posts lately. The reason: I’ve been a little busy leading a team to organize a TEDx talks event. TEDxWellsStreetED on Teacher Voice is coming Sept 28 in Chicago. Our theme: “Exploring Teacher Voice Beyond the Classroom.” Our purpose:

This event will feature a wide range of speakers sharing powerful stories, ideas, and proposals about teaching and learning, and the role of teachers’ voices in education policies. Our aim is to better inform the public and decision-makers about the important work teachers do and the impact of practices and policies — existing ones or those proposed by the speakers — on the classroom. And we hope the talks will encourage more educators to speak out and join the local and national conversations on public education issues.

The event is named after the 2nd superintendent of Chicago Public Schools, who served 1856-1864 and worked to replace rote learning with “a variety of intellectual and physical recreations,” and to reach out to immigrant populations.

We invite Chicago teachers to apply to speak at the event. We seek inspiring, solutions-oriented speakers with stories and ideas about effectiveness and in the classroom and teacher leadership — not just political arguments, as justified as those may be. Talks will be maximum 15 min. long, and will be video-ed and uploaded on YouTube. The invitation links to an online application form.

In addition to teacher speakers, a variety of Chicago citizens will provide perspectives on teachers’ communication with various community constituencies.

More on this to come!