Day One – Friday, November 20th
1:00pm: Opening Ceremonies:
- Master of Ceremonies: Stephen Hurley of VoicEd Radio
- Land Acknowledgement: Monique Manatch, Algonquin Knowledge Keeper
- Welcome Remarks: Ottawa City Mayor Jim Watson
Session 1: The Indigenous Perspective – Educating for Justice
June Girvan, Sylvia Smith and Kyrstin Dumont, introduced by Dean Richard Barwell (See bios.)
June will be speaking to the human rights work that she’s involved with while raising awareness of the legacies of those courageous human rights advocates who are no longer with us. June’s vision is one of creating communities where children are truly valued. She will explore the gifts that children and youth possess to change their worlds through engaging long-time educator Sylvia Smith, and award-winning Kyrstin Dumont, accomplished Anishinaabe Kwe youth from Kitigan Zibi. Together, they will share their experiences in education with a view to urging those in the Education Community to do better–to respect Indigenous children and youth as they continue to navigate a culturally and historically violent institution.
Session 2, 2:00pm: UNICEF Child Friendly Cities Initiative
Dr. Sue Bennett and Ottawa City Councillor Rawlson King, introduction by Monjur Chowdhury. (See bios.)
Sue and Rawlson are working together to meet the requirements of UNICEF for Ottawa to be declared a Child Friendly City. We will learn about these requirements, what they mean to the city, and what is involved in accomplishing the task they have undertaken. The Child Friendly Community Day, as its name suggests, stems from the UNICEF Child Friendly Cities Initiative.
Session 3, 3:00pm: Tribute to Sir Ken Robinson: Putting Children & Youth into a World Perspective
Dr. Peter Gamewell, Dr. Fiona McDonnell and Marsha Shack with moderator Dr. Michael Wilson. (See bios.)
This is a panel discussion paying tribute to Sir Ken Robinson and focusing on what might be Ken’s finest gift to humanity, his “Thoughts on the Call to Unite“. Peter was a friend of Ken’s and shares his views. He will talk broadly about what Ken has meant to him, and to educators and young people around the world. Fiona will shed light on Ken’s call to unite and how we need to heed his advice to press reset, which he explains in “Thoughts on the Call to Unite”. Marsha is a big picture thinker who will share practical examples and strategies for demonstrating how Ken’s global vision is possible, enjoyable, and essential to our existence.
Session 4, 4:00pm: The Child Friendly Home
Akilah S. Richards, Marley Richards, Meghan Wills, Stephanie Sewell, Oliver Przednowek, Richard Sharpe. (See bios.)
This session considers the most important component of the child friendly community – the child friendly home. Akilah, author of the newly published “Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing Work“, is unable to attend the conference, but she will be providing a prerecorded introduction to the session. Marley and Oliver are youth who have experienced unschooling and they will share their views on the child friendly home. Meghan will then facilitate a conversation with Marley, Oliver, and unschooling parents, Stephanie and Richard.
Register Here
Day Two – Saturday, November 21st
Overview: At the heart of this conference is the idea that we change our culture by changing how children and youth acquire their education. The second day of the conference focuses on the kinds of learning environments children and youth need to flourish, the kinds of teachers they need to become democratic citizens, the way a community can be a resource for a school, and how a school can be a resource for its community. It offers a look at education through the eyes of the students and builds awareness of how we can meet the needs of all students. The day concludes with sessions conducted by thoughtful, innovative teachers who will convey that we need not despair. There are change agents within publicly funded education systems who have vision and who can lead the way, with the support of the community, to the new normal we all want.
Session 1, 9:00am: Democratic Education
Yaacov Hecht, Video Introduction by Rabbi Idan Scher (See bios.)
This session provides the opportunity to meet the man who has meant so much to people pioneering the democratic education approach to learning. Yaacov is an Israeli educator who founded the first school in the world to be called a democratic school. He has since been involved in the creation of around 30 democratic schools in Israel. In 1993 he convened the first IDEC – International Democratic Education Conference, an annual conference that continues to connect educators, schools, and organizations. There are now hundreds of democratic schools around the world.
Session 2, 10:00 am: The Democratic Teacher
Derry Hannam, Announcer: Stephen Soutajan (See bios.)
Derry spent decades in the British public school system as a teacher, school administrator and school inspector. In his recently published book, he provides a realistic view of how he was able to create a democratic classroom environment with 11 year olds. It exemplifies how individual teachers can be democratic despite the constraints placed upon them by the conventional school model. Currently he is asking people to consider his 20% proposal where students work on school curriculum 80% of their time and are able to pursue their own interests during other 20%. The 20% time is to help students assume responsibility and to hone the 4Cs attriutes that employers are complaining are too lacking in today’s graduates. The 4Cs, creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication are best acquired by people who have a good degree of autonomy.
Session 3, 11:00: A Case Study from Portsmouth, UK
Ben Dowling, Sarah Christoper, David Hart, Steve Labedz, Ella Reilly, Announcer Ian Bingeman (See bios.)
Portsmouth, UK is a small city on England’s South Coast with a population of a little over 250,000. Portsmouth is known for its rich Naval history but in the world of education, it has become an example of a city that truly embraces the power of student voice. ‘The Council of Portsmouth Students’ (CoPS) is a youth forum which brings together young people from across the city’s secondary schools and colleges (ages 11-18) to create a space whereby students can actively participate in the agenda of whole school improvement. What makes this youth forum particularly unique is its longevity (having been in place since 2003) and the commitment shown by schools who jointly fund the coordination of the forum by Unloc. Unloc is a Portsmouth-born social enterprise which is on a mission to empower young people to be innovative changemakers who seek to build stronger communities and sustainable businesses. The company was founded by two young people (ages 16 & 19) who were involved in CoPS as students and who stepped in when government funding for the forum was withdrawn. In this session, hear from the people involved in creating and maintaining Portsmouth’s learning community, putting young people at the centre.
12:00 – 12:30: Lunch Break
The Zoom room will remain open for performances and informal chats.
Session 4, 12:30: A Sense of Wellbeing
Jim Flannery, Announcer Walker Meyn (See bios.)
Jim attended public school in the United States in a Connecticut suburb. He got top grades that allowed him to go on to obtain a biomedical engineering degree from a top University where he graduated magna cum laude. By all conventional metrics, 22-year old Jim appeared to be the poster child for a successful public education system.
As a surprising twist, at 27 years of age, Jim left the tech startup world and took a job as a physics teacher at a public high school. Within a year, Jim left teaching high school to create an alternative to the conventional school system.
Why the change of heart?
Find out in this exciting discussion, where Jim hosts a group of teens from the Peer Unschooling Network (PUN) to discuss the amplification of youth voice in the public education system.
If you want to prepare for the session, please read The Academia Manifesto. This landmark document, featured on the National Youth Rights Association (NYRA) website, was drafted by PUN members Katherine Farr & Walker Myen as part of NYRA’s Age of Youth campaign.
Session 5, 1:30: Imagining the Possibilities
Heather MacTaggart and Grace Workman-Porecki, Announcer Carl Rust (See bios.)
We all believe that children have the right to be heard, and to have what they say matter. But do the structures and practices of our schools support those beliefs? What would schools look like if we actually took children’s rights seriously? Heather is a social-entrepreneur and an advocate for public education. She presents the concept of the “Free Learner” that could be the answer to providing a quality education while cultivating a sense of dignity and wellbeing in all students. She invites people to imagine the possibilities and urges parents and educators to think about what needs to change if we truly believe in honouring the rights of children.
The Final Two Sessions of the Day
There is reason to be optimistic that we can emerge from the pandemic on track to meet the learning needs of all students. This requires thoughtful, innovative teachers. The following two sessions are meant to assure people that we have within our school boards the personnel capable of ushering in, with strong public support, a new age for public education. The innovative teachers in these sessions will be speaking for themselves, not as representative of their school boards, but the directors of their respective boards will introduce them signalling top level support for bottom up change initiatives.
Session 6, 2:30: Teachers as Change Agent – Part 1
Cameron (Cam) Jones with Stephen Hurley of VoicEd; introduction by Camille Williams-Taylor (See bios.)
Cam is the lead teacher for his board’s experiential learning program designed to help the board achieve a pillar of its strategic plan, which is to create a culture of innovation. Cam and Stephen plan to do a live recording of their VoicEd podcast titled The 55-Minute Question. From these podcasts we observe a deeply committed teacher who is genuinely motivated by what he believes is right.
Session 7, 3:30: Teachers as Change Agent – Part 2
Alison Kinahan; introduction by Tom D’Amico (See bios.)
Alison has worked with June Girvan on issues of equity and anti-black racism. She is versed in Michael Fullan’s ideas about Deep Learning, which are project-based and designed to cultivate youth agency. On this topic, she has been a presenter at other international conferences, most recently virtually with the New Zealand Deep Learning conference. Alison is the author of “What we know about culturally responsive pedagogy: Connections to Deep Learning“, published in New Pedagogies for Deep Learning. She has also published an article in Leaders & Learners titled “Exploring Equity”.
Register Here
Day Three: Sunday, November 22nd
Session 1, 9am – 9:50am: Youth led – Sofa Chat
Bella Vasquez and Yaacov Hecht (See bios.)
(Continuation of Session 1 Saturday, November 21)
Session 2, 10am-10:50am: Youth led – Sofa Chat
Bella Vasquez and Derry Hannam (See bios.)
(Continuation of Session 2 Saturday, November 21)
Session 3, 11am-11:50am: Chat with Jim Flannery
(Continuation of Session 4 Saturday, November 21)
Session 4, 12-12:50pm: National Collaboration for Youth Mental Health
Alex Emmanuel, Angelique Francis, Guyleigh Johnson, Kyrstin Dumont and Wendy Russell; Introduction by Maxine Awedella (See bios.)
Session 5, 1pm-1:50pm: Sociocracy in Democratic Schools – a case study
Marianne Osório and Charlie Shread; Introduced by Stephanie Shuler (See bios.)
Marianne is a Brazilian educator and researcher. Charlie is a British filmmaker. Together they created Wondering School, a research project that investigates a humanizing and democratic education. They also produced and directed the documentary School Circles about democratic schools in the Netherlands that use Sociocracy as a method of governance.
In this presentation they will share an extract from School Circles film to illustrate how children can make collective decisions using Sociocracy. They will explain the main principles of the governance system, show examples of “School Circle Structures” and share how decisions are made based on consent. This is a case study showing six democratic schools and relating the theory of Sociocracy to its practice in an Education context.
Session 6, 2pm-2:50pm: Youth Run – Child Friendly Community Day Brainstorming Session; Introduction by Elizabeth Campbell
Session 7, 3pm-3:50pm: Chat with Heather MacTaggart and Cameron Jones (Continuation of Sessions 5 and 6 Saturday, November 21)