EDTalks: Strategies for Rediscovering Our Common Humanity

EDTalks is a lively series of community conversations about public education and related issues that impact our young people. Each EDTalks features two compelling, short presentations by cutting-edge educators, youth advocates, students, artists or community leaders. EDTalks is supported by a generous grant from the Bush Foundation. This EDTalks is titled “Strategies for Rediscovering Our Common Humanity” Our featured speaker is Dr. Jackie Vertigan. In our increasingly polarized cultural and political environment, where it has arguably become much harder to engage in civilized discussion with those we may oppose, Dr. Jackie Vertigan is holding on to optimism. In her EDTalk, she will pull from personal experiences, research, and identifiable public trends to explore the contemporary experience of dissent and negative discourse. She will share her approach for looking beyond the statements, opinions, and personalities of those from whom we differ and, instead, find concrete ways to identify commonalities – at very least, our shared humanity. She will also provide reason for optimism and encourage personal action for spreading that optimism. This virtual EDTalk was live streamed online on October 27th, 2022.