#WeAreLRNG. One Way To Meet an Innovation Challenge @CWPFairfield. We Too Are Connecticut! The Webinar

A year ago, six teachers from Connecticut schools collaborated with CWP-Fairfield to apply for an LRNG Innovation Challenge Grant, funded by the John Legend Campaign, MacArthur Foundation, and National Writing Project. Knowing our collaborative work with the CT Mirror for Special Report: Education, Diversity, and Change in Fairfield County,  we wanted to find a way for students in our schools to have a similar opportunity for partnering with each other in and out of our classrooms.

The result was We Too Are Connecticut, a project that reached several hundred young people at Bassick, Staples, Joel Barlow, Darien, Central and Global Studies High Schools. The work culminated, too, at Fairfield University with the Writing Our Lives - Digital Ubuntu conference. There, author Matt de la Peña keynoted and featured We Were Here and Robert Galinsky arrived to offer workshops on public speaking and performance. We achieve our goal of providing writing opportunities for youth from a variety of schools to share with each other. Teachers mentored TedTalks, blogging, ethnographic mapping, and radio shows. The amount of writing produced by their wonderful students is admirable and humbling. It is, however, the result of incredible teachers and the willingness of LRNG to invest in them.

Last night, Educator Innovator featured three projects that benefited from the LRNG investment, including We Too Are Connecticut. I am extremely proud of Kim Herzog of Staples High School and Megan Zabilansky of Joel Barlow High School for the sharing they did for the webinar community.

Featured here are what they had to say. I can write on and on and on about their work, but the interview says it all. 

We Were Here, indeed. Very proud to post this on a Thursday morning.