Kingian Nonviolence Book Club – The Trumpet of Conscience

Trumpets of ConscienceThis week in the Kingian Nonviolence Book Club, we discussed The Trumpet of Conscience. It was a fascinated discussion and it became very clear how prescient Dr. King was in recognizing social problems and ills that were emerging and on the horizon during his times. On the one hand, this book was inspiring in that he does provide creative ideas and motivation for addressing these problems. On the other hand, it was clear that not enough people have read Dr. King’s words or taken his ideas to heart since many of the problems he identified over 50 years ago have only gotten worse. Continue reading to see the questions we discussed and excerpts from the book that speak to those questions.

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2013 AU Social Learning Summit

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This past Friday I was a panelist for the “Faculty Face Off” session at American University’s Social Learning Summit – a 2.5 day conference organized by AU’s Social Media Club that looks at the current and emerging role, trends, and a techniques of using social media tools in learning and education. I was joined by moderator Meghan Foster, and panelists Scott Talan, Jim Quirk, and Stef Woods. In the spirit of the summit, my reflection on the experience will be organized by tweets that members of the audience shared during the discussion.

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Peace Education Presentation for Global Kids

Global Kids Presentation

This week I had the opportunity to give a presentation and lead some exercises around peace education with a group of 35 high school students (9th and 10th graders) from two schools in Queens, NY. They were visiting DC as part of a Global Kids trip. Global Kids is an “educational organization for global learning and youth development – works to ensure that urban youth have the knowledge, skills, experiences and values they need to succeed in school, participate effectively in the democratic process, and achieve leadership in their communities and on the global stage.” This was a unique and valuable experience for a number of reasons I will outline below and I very much appreciated the time I got to spend with the students.

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Fletcher Summer Institute Promotional Video

Every year at ICNC we try and find new and better ways to advertise and promote our various educational programs and initiatives. This year I took on a project to create this promotional video about our annual Fletcher Summer Institute. I used photos from past FSIs and excerpts from a variety of interviews I helped conduct for another video project on which I am working. I found the background music using dig.ccmixter.org and I used iMovie to edit everything together. After posting it online, I utilized some of YouTube’s video embed link functions that allow viewers to click on the video and link out to other web pages such as the FSI application page and footage from previous FSIs. My goal was to keep the video short, inspirational and a way for viewers to directly access materials to apply and learn more. Lastly, the video was shared on the website, Waging Nonviolence, along with a blog posting I wrote about my experiences at FSI.

Civil Resistance Talk with Burmese Delegation

Burmese Delegation USIP

This past Tuesday my colleague, Althea Middleton-Detzner and I got the opportunity and privilege to give a presentation and have a discussion on civil resistance with a group of amazing Burmese civil society and political leaders.  The four women in the delegation were Khin Lay, Shunn Lei Swe Yee, Ma Nilar OO, and Zin Mar Aung, who was a recipient the 2012 International Women of Courage Award.  The United States Institute of Peace invited us to give the talk, which was part of a series of meetings with the delegation that focused on rule of law, governance and, of course, nonviolent political action (aka civil resistance).

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2013 Democracy Matters Summit

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From February 1-3, 50 students from around the country gathered in Albany, NY for the Democracy Matters Summit – an intensive and inspiring 2.5 days of learning about and strategizing around how to get big money out of politics and put people back in. This was my seventh Democracy Matters Summit. It is such a honor and privilege to be a part of this amazing organization and movement.  Click the link below to see the curation of key tweets, photos, and audio recordings from the weekend.

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Ann Ferren Teaching Conference

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This past weekend I attended and presented at the Ann Ferren Teaching Conference, which is a yearly conference held every January at American University.  The last time I attended this conference was in 2010 and had gotten a lot out of it.  This year I was invited to be a co-presenter for one of the sessions, “Finding Your First Flip: Getting Started with the Flipped Classroom Model.  My co-presenters for this session were Maya Marato and Meghan Foster.  The Goal for this session is to engage faculty in the process of “flipping” their lectures by helping them identify and evaluate topics and activities that are easily adapted to the flipped classroom model.

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