Theres different people i have not always agreed with that have he title, chief of staff. Im a High School History teachber training, taught in shuck public schooling ford ten years and lucky enough to land a position on staff at the ctu but at my core im still in the classroom and i milled it greatly. Im really alreadied to be hike talking with two people who i admire immensely and you should be excited to be here with them today. Im also honored to be part of printers row litfest. Were here to honor books and i would like to say my dining room is also the place where i honor books. Ive run out of space on my shelfs and now you cant dine in there, but the books have a nice home. So today were here with Elizabeth Todd vrelnan. The off the or instant classic, black politics and education reform in chicago since then 1960s. Is required reading youre a chicagoan or care about Public Education today and as many of you probably foe, also one the neuer new appointee those Chicago Public Scho
Subject, but i know perfectly well that if they did not have tests or papers, if they were not held accountable, none of the seats would be empty. None of you have to be here, but you did come, so i find that very flattering. I could, i suppose, give you a test at the end. The title of my talk, which i forgot until jamie just mentioned it is the unknown aaron burr. I will read a bit about my book about aaron burr. The title of my book is called the heartbreak of aaron burr. Whole story you the without giving away the ending. I dont want to give away the ending because its not just that i want you to buy the book and read the book and enjoy it and hang around till the end, but it has to do with the reason i wrote the book in the first place. This goes back to my experience of writing, my experience of reading and in particular, my experience of listening to a question that my mother has been for the last 23 or 24 years. The question i will get to in a moment, but it goes to the heart of
Obamas. This is one of my pinch mes, to be here with you. [applause] so i want to begin with i was stalking you last night on twitter and dont worry, you wont even know im there. And i noticed a tweet from you that i just want to get a little bit of a read about where we are right now in this moment because this has been a a troubling week for democracy in this country, and you tweeted a statement by the federal Elections Commission Ellen Weintraub expressing her dismay and distress, and the fact that she would not allow her office to endorse or abet a foreign power providing opposition information to a candidate in an election, which donald trump said he would accept. Im just wondering about that, what do you think about this moment and what do we all need to do to ensure that our elections are fair and free from corruption . Well, i have to say, i have conflicting feelings about social media. I have kind of a lovehate relationship with it. In a lot of ways, its brought us together to
Different phenomena and if you will all under common road break and it prompted the question what are the commonalities here . Why is it that it seems like so many people have simultaneously lost their minds . [laughter] im here today in part because i care a great deal about the fine art of not losing your mind. And asking questions about how do we return to a somewhat more sane place in our politics . One of the things that this book highlighted at least for me is that all these phenomenon seem to be happening in two main locations. One of them is the campus environment and the other is of course social media. What are these two environments have in common . I would like to offer three answers, perhaps our panelists will have their own or will have responses to mine. My three answers at least are as follows. First theres the toto effect, the total effect is a wellknown phenomenon in Political Science where when a society undertakes to reform itself that is often precisely the moment
[applause] the hon. London breed and let me say, today is about networking, today is about coming together, but we all have to remember is we still have challenges in this country. And part of what were challenged today is to take our knowledge, to take what we learned, to take this excitement and spread this all over the city and all over the board rooms, positions as c. E. O. S of fortune 500 companies. So the goal here is to sink in all this advanced knowledge and think about ways that we can put our best selves forward, but also, we always have to remember to reach back and pull up one another. Thats what today is all about, because ill tell you, had it not been for some of the most incredib incredible women in my community, the amazing mentors who looked out for me, i dont know where id be. Ill just tell you a quick story. My first job at age 14 was working as a place called the Family School. Now, i showed up the first day. Maybe i wasnt necessarily dressed like i am in my mayora