On Nov. 12th, 2015, we will show preview clips from our upcoming short film "Think of Calvin" at a tremendous Race & Justice Summit in Washington, DC being organized by the Atlantic magazine's Atlantic Live program and featuring Atlantic correspondent and author Ta-Nehisi Coates. TEACHED Producer/Director Kelly Amis will speak at the event. To register, go here.
Posts filed under Media Coverage
TEACHED Update July 2015
Don't miss the latest! Oakland Youth Challenge Silicon Valley, Code Oakland receives awards, upcoming film festival screenings, and more.
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WE ♥ TEACH FOR AMERICA'S ONE DAY MAGAZINE
The most recent One Day, Teach for America’s alumni magazine, featured a fantastic article about Kelly's journey into filmmaking and the motivation behind TEACHED. In "Mini-Lessons" (pg. 61) writer Calvin Hennick does a great job capturing the potential of the TEACHED short film format and interactive screening model.
As Kelly says in the article, "with film, you can reach people at a more visceral level...it puts a face to the issues and connects people in ways that stats, research and analysis never will.” If you are looking for a way to engage your community in education reform, consider hosting a TEACHED Vol. I screening today.
Also don’t miss the profiles of Kelly and the other 2013 TFA-Social Innovation & Excellence in Teaching Award Winners (same issue, pages 68-72).
GOOGLE LIVE CHAT RE: THE PATH TO PRISON
Thanks to all of you who participated in our LIVE GoogleChat with React to Film. To learn more, we highly recommend:
- Reading The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander.
- Watching 12 Years a Slave, notice how one of the slave owners' greatest fears is their slaves learning how to read and write.
- Watching videos on our Youtube page, TEACHEDTV.
- Organizing a screening of TEACHED Vol. I to bring more people into the conversation. Go to our Screenings Page. We will help you organize a meaningful event.
- Checking out the organizations we've listed on our Take Action Page. These are just a few of the best organizations working for education equality today.
- VOTE for and support candidates for public office who will demand change in our education and judicial systems.
Missed the Google LIVE Chat? Watch it now:
REACT to FILM Presents a LIVE Google Hangout with TEACHED: The Path to Prison Director Kelly Amis
TO JOIN THIS LIVE CHAT GO HERE.
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Join us on Wednesday, February 5th at 5pm PST (8pm EST) for the REACT to FILM LIVE GoogleHangoutOnAir with our very own TEACHED: The Path to Prison Producer/Director Kelly Amis.
REACT to FILM is an organization that focuses on leveraging documentary filmmaking to promote social responsibility and spark civic engagement through their High School Education Program and College Action Network.
Thanks to the hard work from REACT to FILM and its college chapter leaders, The Path to Prison was recently screened at over forty universities across the country. We thank them so much for their partnership and hard work.
To participate in the online conversation, be sure to watch the short film The Path to Prison on SnagFilms here if you have not seen it already and then join the Google Hangout here. Then you will be ready to fire up any questions you may have for Kelly regarding the difficult issues presented by the school to prison pipeline.
On Twitter? Use #teached #pathtoprison #edequality hashtags to share and continue the conversation with @KellyAmis and @TEACHED!
SCHOOL CHOICE WEEK
Takepart.com asked me to write a column during this year's School Choice Week, which celebrates parents accessing new educational options for their children, mostly through charter schools and publicly-funded private school vouchers. I was happy for the chance to reflect on where we are today in the fight to give more children the opportunities that are normally reserved for wealthy parents only. Please read:
IF YOU THINK SEGREGATION IS OVER THINK AGAIN
Year of the Education Documentary-- Turning into a Decade?
We are thrilled to be included in this new Harvard Political Review article about the advent and ongoing production of education reform documentary films that started about a year ago, Silver Screens and Blackboards.
As the article explains, TEACHED will not just talk ABOUT teachers, we will let teachers do the talking. Over more than two years of filming interviews across the country, we have learned first-hand that many teachers are clear about what solutions would eliminate the achievement gap, improve their work environments and increase the opportunities for their students' success.
What's amazing is that parents, students, principals and many education leaders by and large support the same changes. So what's the hold up?
Today, education debates are incredibly polarized, reduced to ridiculously simple "pro" or "con" stances: people and reforms are labeled as "pro" or "anti" teacher, "pro" or "anti" charter school, "pro" or "anti" union, etc. etc.
The TEACHED short film series will try to break through these simplistic arguments and show what commonsense--and just about everyone on the ground--would have us do to improve schools.
Where Superheroes and Sisyphus Meet...
...welcome to American education reform!
This article was published today on 3 Quarks Daily, a very unique website with stories and writers from all over the world writing about current events, politics, literature, science and more. I'll be writing a monthly column for them.
Check out the first one:
A Film of the Filmmakers
New Schools Venture Fund has posted videos from their annual conference, including the panel discussion "Schools Hit the Big Screen," which featured TEACHED and Waiting for Superman. You can now watch the entire panel discussion on vimeo!
We introduce ourselves in the first clip:
They show the trailers in the second (including the trailer for The Lottery by Madeleine Sackler)
And the following three clips present the entire Q&A with the panelists. If you want to hear why I decided to make TEACHED, go to 5:38 in Clip #3. Hopefully you won't be able to tell how incredibly nervous I was!
HE REALLY IS A LEGEND!
PRODUCTION UPDATE:
We recently returned from our final (fingers crossed) shoots in NYC and DC, and it was such an inspiring trip. Every one we interviewed taught us so much.
The highlight of New York was getting to interview John Legend, musician/performer/ songwriter extraordinaire, who also happens to be a passionate (and very knowledgeable) advocate for equality in education!