Forum Network

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

Edmund Barry Gaither on Art History and Curation

Wed, Apr 10, 2002

Art historian and curator Edmund Barry Gaither discusses his work at the Museum of the National Center for Afro-American Artists. This lecture is part of the Arts in Education Program's John Landrum Bryant Lecture Performance Series.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
No Excuses: Closing the Racial Gap in Learning

Wed, Apr 7, 2004

Abigail Thernstrom, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, and Harvard historian Stephan Thernstrom, discuss their new book about the racial gap in academics.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
Meet the Poet: Dana Gioia

Tue, Feb 10, 2004

Dana Gioia speaks about the relationship between poetry and education. **Dana Gioia**, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, is an internationally-acclaimed poet. His books include *Can Poetry Matter?* and the award-winning poetry collection *Interrogations at Noon*. A teacher of writing at several colleges, Gioia founded "Teaching Poetry," a conference dedicated to improving high school teaching of poetry and the West Chester University Conference on Form and Narrative, the nation's largest annual all-poetry writing conference.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
Education Reform in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Thu, Feb 10, 2005

Helen Ladd and Edward Fiske speak about their recent book, *Elusive Equity: Education Reform in Post-Apartheid South Africa*, which tells the story of South Africa's efforts to fashion a racially equitable state education system out of the ashes of apartheid. Fiske and Ladd describe and evaluate the policy strategies that South Africa pursued in its quest for racial equity. They draw on previously unpublished data, interviews with key officials, and visits to dozens of schools to describe the changes made in school finance, teacher assignment policies, governance, curriculum, higher education, and other areas.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
Fragments: Links between Cognitive Science and Education Policy

Thu, Feb 24, 2005

Michael J. Feuer of the National Research Council presents the second in a series of lectures on links between cognitive science and education policy. This lecture focuses on sources of complexity in the American school system and implications for the design of rational models of education policy. Feuer emphasizes the intended and unintended effects of the fragmented system of school governance that exists in the US, the limitations this imposes on the use of existing measurement tools to gauge individual and institutional progress, and the problems that arise from accountability systems that inadvertently create incentives for opportunistic behavior among students, teachers, and school authorities. Given these constraints, Feuer argues for a new approach to understanding the strengths and weaknesses of alternative governance models, defining rational goals for education policy, and setting reasonable expectations for improvement. **Michael J. Feuer** is Executive Director of the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education at the National Research Council of the National Academies.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
"L" is for Literacy: Reading with Children

Wed, Mar 2, 2005

Harvard Graduate School of Education celebrates the work of Dr. Seuss, with a forum to discuss children's literacy, the effects of parent-child and child self-motivated book reading, and child literacy programs. Initially created as a one-day event to celebrate reading, the National Education Association's Read Across America has grown into a nationwide initiative that promotes reading every day of the year and culminates on March 2nd, the birthday of Dr. Seuss.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
Becoming Literate: Baltimore Early Childhood Project

Tue, Mar 8, 2005

Robert Serpell, vice chancellor at the University of Zambia, discusses the results of his five-year study tracing literacy development in pre-kindergarten through third-grade children from low- and middle- income families of European and African heritage in Baltimore. His presentation centers on how the concept of intimate family culture can assist in moving the discussion of educational disadvantage beyond stereotyped accounts of various social addresses. Catherine Snow, the Henry Lee Shattuck professor of Education, will provide an introduction.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
Chinese in America: A Narrative History

Thu, May 1, 2003

Iris Chang, author of *Thread of the Silkworm* and *The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II*, an account of Japanese war crimes in Nanking, China, speaks about her latest book, *The Chinese in America: A Narrative History*.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
(Not) Talking About Race Talk

Wed, May 5, 2004

Mica Pollock discusses race talk dilemmas with local educators, as presented in her new book, Colormute: Race Talk Dilemmas in an American School.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education
W.B. Yeats: The Arch-Poet

Wed, Dec 10, 2003

Roy Foster speaks about the final volume in his acclaimed biography W.B. Yeats, A Life, Volume II: The Arch-Poet 1915-1939. **Roy Foster**is the Carroll professor of Irish history at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Hartford College. He is author of numerous books including Charles Stewart Parnell and Lord Randolph Churchill: A Political Life.

Forum Network

Partner:

Harvard Graduate School of Education