[This report is being filed by Erin Kreeger, a member of Texas Forums, graduate of the Fielding Graduate University's Certification in Dialogue, Deliberation and Public Engagement and an adviser to the University of Houston Downtown's Center for Public Deliberation. Erin will be an ongoing guest blogger for Texas Forums so check back often to hear [...]
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At the UHD workshop on Day 1 we had people work in small groups to craft responses to challenges that a moderator might encounter. Tom Workman did a fabulous job of leading this exercise. I’m glad that we have a video recording so I can go back and harvest his pearls of wisdom.
People are just [...]
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I’ve asked Virginia York to take notes here of the debrief of the Everyday Deliberation exercise we are doing at UHD where people tell stories of a time when they had to make a difficult decision and deliberated personally. The participants work in triads. One person tells their story, another person is the questioner who [...]
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I am writing this from the University of Houston Downtown’s Center for Public Deliberation training for new moderators. For the past two months, I have been working with Windy Lawrence and Tom Workman, the co-directors of this new endeavor. We are finally doing our first training session for moderators in Houston. We have 25 participants [...]
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On Thursday, October 18th, about 60 teachers, administrators, parents, government officials, and youth gathered at Reagan High School in Austin, TX for a series of three forums on “Too Many Children Left Behind: Closing the Achievement Gap in Central Texas.” The diverse group is gathering on behalf of a diverse Austin Independent School District. Other [...]
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Posted in Workshops and Seminars on September 17, 2007 | No Comments »
On National Presidential Caucus Day — Friday, December 7, 2007 — thousands of local, self-organized, Internet-enabled, face-to-face gatherings across the country will convene in caucus to discuss and deliberate candidates and the issues. Participants will voice their preferences at their choice of a local Republican Caucus, Democratic Caucus or at an Open Caucus.
Just prior to [...]
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In August, two of Texas Forums’ own - Diane Miller of Envision Central Texas and Tim Eubanks of Austin Voices for Education and Youth - had the unique opportunity to explore the concepts of deliberation with 150 innovative and passionate young people at a conference in Washington D.C. entitled “Bridging the Partisan Divide: Rediscovering [...]
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“Democracy is a beautiful idea – government by and for the people. Democracy promises us the freedom to exercise out highest capacities while it protects us from our worst tendencies. In democracy as it ought to be, all adults are free to chime in, to join the conversation on how they should arrange their life [...]
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Dr. Betty Sue Flowers, LBJ Library Director and co-founder of Texas Forums will be speaking to the Central Texas World Future Society on May 15, 2007. This meeting will be a fifth anniversary celebration of the Centex WFS.
The celebration will be held at the meeting room of Marie Callender’s, 9503 Research Blvd. # 400., Austin, [...]
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Posted in Workshops and Seminars on February 6, 2007 | 1 Comment »
Want to go back to school without the pressure and the expense?
Bill Ball, an NIF colleague at the College of New Jersey is inviting the public to participate in his seminar on Deliberative Democracy. This is an extraordinary opportunity to connect with students and to benefit from a structured learning environment. Bill is using the [...]
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