Tentative Schedule

Tracy Ore: Life Lessons Cultivated in a Garden. Drawing on her experiences over the last ten years of cultivating a community garden in Central Minnesota, Tracy Ore’s talk will address the life lessons that have emerged from her journey which began with a search for community and ended in places she never imagined.

Brayton Shanley: Who Are We and How Are We to Live in this World? Brayton Shanley discusses why learning what is important is critical in this information age.

Jake Malavsky. Jake will use his student experience to identify several “ideal conditions” which make future students more receptive to education in, and outside, of the classroom.

Nancy Lublin: Texting Saves Lives. When Nancy Lublin started texting teenagers to help with her social advocacy organization, what she found was shocking—they started texting back about their own problems, from bullying to depression to abuse. So she’s setting up a text-only crisis line, and the results might be even more important than she expected.

J. David Waldman: Brewing Great Coffee. Join J. David Waldman from Rojo’s Roastery in Lambertville to learn to brew coffee following this small-batch artisan coffee roaster’s best-practices. Meet in the East Mezzanine.

Jo Adachi: Anyone Can Draw (Yes, Even You). Join George School Painting and Drawing teacher Jo Adachi to learn simple tools to create drawings that will allow you to recreate what you see. Meet in first floor Classroom 182.

Kate Smith-Ducati: Growing Organically. Join Kate Smith-Ducati on a tour of our organic garden. Tended by members of our community, the garden supplies the kitchen with fresh herbs and seasonal vegetables. The garden is also home to chickens, guinea hens, and a turkey. Use the west exit doors in the North Gym and meet in the Organic Garden.

Natalie Nixon: The Nudge Imperative. Natalie Nixon reflects on how critical it is to cultivate intuition to navigate a world saturated with sensory overload, hyper-competitiveness, and a preponderance of external showcasing via social media platforms.

Greg Gage: How to Control Someone Else’s Arm with Your Brain. Greg Gage is on a mission to make brain science accessible to all. In this demo, the neuroscientist and TED Senior Fellow uses a simple, inexpensive DIY kit to take away the free will of an audience member. It’s not a parlor trick; it actually works. You have to see it to believe it.

Setareh Ekhteraei: What is School? Setareh Ekhteraei discusses the importance of teaching students to adapt to and confront change. Growing up in Iran, where change is rampant and individual circumstances can change rapidly, she talks about compassion, resilience, and the need for students to be multi-faceted.

Emmy Laybourne: Digital Natives Got To Be Creative. Novelist Emmy Laybourne describes her childhood growing up as the daughter of the founder of Nickelodeon and the foundation it gave her to view media through a creative lens. Emmy then uses clips from YouTube to illustrate the power that comes with being able to diagnose story structure problems and how this simple skill can turn a kid from a consumer of media into a creator.

West Philadelphia Orchestra: Library Desk Concert. The Musicians of West Philadelphia Orchestra are messengers of Balkan music, joy, and good will and merchants of musical mayhem. Each time they come to campus they have toes tapping and feet dancing and leave an indelible impression.

Adam Finkel: Making Wise Choices. Students learn at their own expanding rates, and the number, the breadth, and the seriousness of the choices they face grows too. Adam argues that educators have a glaring blind spot: we teach material, and the best schools explain the connections among fields of knowledge, but we don’t teach the art and skill of making wise choices.

Medard Gabel: Saving the World 101. Medard Gabel provides an alternative narrative challenging students to make the world work for everyone (not just the 1 percent). He asks about the prerogatives and responsibilities of living in the 21st century— where everything is interconnected in increasingly and unprecedented ways.

Ama Karikari: The Most Important Lesson to Teach Children. Ama Karikari discusses hair conformity/uniformity rules in schools as a lens through which we might understand how schools fail to nurture innovation, creativity, and authenticity. Innovation, creativity, and authenticity are among the most important qualities to inspire in students during these times of rapid technological and cultural change.

Tavi Gevinson: A Teen Just Trying to Figure It Out. Fifteen-year-old Tavi Gevinson had a hard time finding strong female, teenage role models — so she built a space where they could find each other. Rookie, her wildly popular web magazine for and by teen girls, is one of the sites putting a new, unapologetically uncertain and richly complex face on modern feminism.

Michael Lo Stracco: The Practice of Pause. George School Religion teacher and experienced meditator and mindfulness instructor, Michael Lo Stracco, will guide participants in a mindfulness meditation that encourages open, observant,and non-judgmental awareness and attention. Meet in the Garrett Family Movement Studio, Mezzanine Level.

Jackie Coren: The Power of Song in Building Community. Sing-along to old and new favorites from Broadway, the Beatles, and beyond with George School Chorale Director Jackie Coren. Meet in first floor Classroom 182.

Kate Smith Ducati: Exploring George School’s Organic Garden. If you didn’t have an earlier opportunity, join Kate Smith Ducati for a tour of our organic garden. Use the west exit doors in the North Gym and meet in the Organic Garden.

Ran’D Shine: A Timeline in the Evolution of Teaching and Learning the Art of Prestidigitation. The advancement of technology has helped with the efficiency in the way we are teaching, learning, and processing information. But when it comes to applying acquired information to practice, Ran’D Shine demonstrates how technology is best used in conjunction with an interactive, didactic approach.

Sarahh Scher: Blind Spots. Sarahh Scher discusses the importance of cultural context and teaching art history. Providing a specific context resists the urge to overwrite another culture—and other people—with our own, and creates understanding, empathy, and a flexible, global worldview.

Lisa Donnelly: Drawing on Humor for Change. New Yorker cartoonist Liza Donnelly shares a portfolio of her wise and funny cartoons about modern life—and talks about how humor can empower women to change the rules.

Allen Keller