Bale & Knopp (editors)
2012
A series of essays by various teachers on the corporate control of education.
July 21-23 | Virtual
“This means, in a way, that true light is dependent on the presence of other lights. Take the others away and darkness results. Yet the reverse is not true: take away darkness and there is only more darkness. Darkness can exist by itself. Light cannot.”
― N.K. Jemisin, The Broken Kingdoms
In stressful, uncertain times, where cynical powers attempt to divide and isolate us, community and solidarity are acts of resistance. But there are no superheroes here, and no simple answers to be found, only the Quest for Connection. In 2025, we’re responding to the need for community and solidarity in uncertain times by turning Conference to Restore Humanity! into a model for humanizing critical discourse and dialogue: bringing together students and teachers, researchers and doers, thinkers and visionaries to explore complex topics in education and illuminate a path forward together.
Conference to Restore Humanity! is an online conference for progressive educators who seek to transform systems of school toward brighter, engaging spaces.
Sarah M.
Fine
she/her
Relevant, Irreverent, and Real: Lessons in powerful learning from the fringes of schools and systems
In this flipped keynote talk, Dr. Sarah Fine will explore what can be learned from spaces that are often seen as peripheral to the core purposes of school: elective courses, career and technical education pathways, alternative education programs, and extracurricular activities. These spaces, she argues, carry powerful lessons about how to design for authentic relationships and deeper learning. What if, instead of viewing these spaces as an educational afterthought, we treated them as a blueprint for what schools could become?
Sarah M. Fine is an Assistant Professor at UC San Diego, focused on transforming PK-12 schools into humanizing, intellectually vibrant spaces. A former high school English teacher, she earned her doctorate from Harvard in 2017. She founded the San Diego Teacher Residency, a justice-oriented M.Ed. program. Fine has written for The New York Times and scholarly journals, and her co-authored book In Search of Deeper Learning won the 2021 Grawemeyer Award in Education.
.avif)
Resist & Indigenize with Great Plains
Action Society
Join young people from Great Plains Action Society, an Indigenous-led grassroots organization advocating for Indigenous rights, as they speak to their experiences and perspectives as Indigenous youth. How can we dismantle oppressive systems and rebuild with frameworks focused on Indigenous knowledge, culture, and community?
Emma
McMain
she/her
Critical Social and Emotional Learning: Shifting From ‘Competencies’ to ‘Culture’
This workshop takes a fresh approach to social and emotional learning (SEL). Instead of treating it like a checklist or a rigid program, we’ll use SEL as a starting point for open-ended, meaningful conversations! Alongside Dr. Emma McMain, participants will reflect on their own social and emotional values and consider how those values fit into culture, history, and society. By the end of the session, participants will collaborate to create an artifact—whether it’s a list, a mind map, an art piece, or another kind of guide—to help them approach SEL not as a set of skills to hand down to students, but as an ongoing, shared journey of growth.
An Assistant Professor at the University of Arkansas. Drawing on frameworks such as critical discourse analysis, feminist theories, and ecocriticism, Emma explores the intersections of social justice, eco-justice, and the potential of social and emotional learning to advance or hinder equity. Her work includes a “discourse community” approach to teacher PD, critical media analysis, and the development of podcast methodologies as transformative dialogue in education.
Nawal
Qarooni
she/her
Building Nourishing Collaborations: Exalting Our Children and their Caregivers
Our work as educators requires stepping beyond one-off, school-centric events and practices to more deeply embed authentic, engaging collaborations with caregivers that celebrate what families bring to their children’s literacy learning. Alongside facilitator Nawal Qarooni, educator and author of Nourishing Caregiver Collaborations, participants in this workshop will excavate their biases around how families should look, sound, and act; track their own language stories; and validate family practices to weave them into their own curricular work.
A Jersey City-based educator, writer, and adjunct professor, who promotes holistic literacy instruction and the value of family experiences in education, as highlighted in her book Nourishing Caregiver Collaborations: Elevating Home Experiences and Classroom Practices for Collective Care. Drawing from her roles as a teacher, instructional coach, and daughter of immigrants, she collaborates with schools through NQC Literacy.
Angela
Stockman
she/her
Pedagogical Documentation: Learning Stories as Stewardship
In this immersive workshop, educator and author Angela Stockman invites participants to explore how pedagogical documentation serves as an act of stewardship—honoring, preserving, and nurturing rich narratives about learners and learning. Moving beyond traditional measurement, attendees will discover how pedagogical documentation enables us to make a closer and far more complex study of learning and growth while cultivating a legacy that extends beyond our classroom walls. This session equips K-12 educators with practical approaches that can help systems transform assessment from a reductive practice into an act of educational stewardship that not only celebrates curiosity, complexity, and connection in the present, but concerns itself with the future.
An educator, author, and learning facilitator. Her most recent book, The Writing Teacher’s Guide to Pedagogical Documentation, recognized as a 2024 Choice Outstanding Academic Title by the American Library Association, explores how documenting learning processes can deepen understanding and improve writing instruction. Angela’s work emphasizes purposeful play, collaborative inquiry, and culturally sustaining practices.
Vy
Dao
she/her
Vy Dao is a sociologist whose work emphasizes storytelling’s role in creating shared culture. Her previous work on ethnographic methods and qualitative inquiry. Currently, she is the Director of Learning and Practice at Cortico. This nonprofit creates powerful technology tools for communities to engage in healthier public discourse, create constructive debate, and lift up underheard voices.
Charles
Logan
he/him
A former high school English teacher and a current Ph.D. candidate in the Learning Sciences program at Northwestern University. Charles’ scholarship analyzes how power operates through technology, and he works alongside teachers and students to theorize and develop ways to resist, refuse, repurpose, and reimagine technologies towards ends that center care and collective flourishing.
Audrey
Watters
she/her
An independent scholar whose work focuses on the history and politics of education technologies. She is the creator of the popular Hack Education website, currently the writer of the Second Breakfast newsletter, and author of Teaching Machines, which chronicles the century-old efforts to automate education.
Shana Vidal
White
she/her
Shana Vidal White is the Director of CS Equity Initiatives at the Kapor Foundation, focusing on equitable K12 computer science programs like CSforAtlanta, CSforOakland, and CSforDetroit. She works to improve teacher professional development and increase participation for marginalized students in CS and STEAM. Shana authored the Responsible AI and Tech Justice Guide for K12 Education and co-created the Culturally Responsive Sustaining Computer Science Framework. With 16 years in K12 education as a teacher and instructional technology specialist in Atlanta, she holds a B.S. from Wake Forest University, an M.S. from Winthrop University, and an Ed.S from Kennesaw State University. She is deeply committed to justice and equity in education.
Chanea
Bond
she/her
An English educator, a teacher and an eternal student from North Texas. Her graduate work focuses on increasing access to dual credit and advanced academic opportunities for Black and Brown students. She is dedicated to mentoring new educators to make teaching sustainable and advocating for students’ rights through access diverse texts, affirming Black, brown, and LGBTQ+ student identities, and “being the teacher she needed.”
Lucket
Kiche
he/they
A proud educator and Union member in Iowa. Lucket pushes and advocates for the equitable treatment of all minorities and strives to teach about as many intersectionalities that time will allow. We can no longer be complacent with a system that has superficial protections for marginalized people.
Maria
Munro-Schuster
she/her
A Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor in Bozeman, Montana. Maria taught in K - 12 and undergraduate classrooms throughout Montana for thirteen years before beginning mental health work with children, adults, and families. She is the author of the forthcoming book The Empathetic Classroom: How a Mental Health Mindset Supports Your Students—And You.
Will
Richardson
he/him
A former public school educator of 22 years who has spent the last 18 years helping school communities build capacity to navigate the disruptive contexts of our time and to “imagine harder” for a future we all want to live in. Most recently, he is the co-founder of the Big Questions Institute, and he is the author of Confronting Education in a Time of Complexity, Chaos, and Collapse: A Manifesto which he wrote to provoke conversations and action within schools to prepare children for the challenging future at our doorstep.
Flipped Keynote
Watch the recording on your own time, then engage in a live in-depth, extended Q&A session.
Interactive Workshops
Learn from expert facilitators in multi-hour sessions focused on hands-on application and dialogue.
Fireside Chats
An invited panel of experts will talk on pressing critical topics in education, with a lengthy time for audience discussion.
Informal Get-Togethers
Each afternoon, join the community in various conversations, games, activities, and pop-up events.
Authentic
An intentional focus on tangible, implementable ideas presented through "learning by doing."
Accessible
Access recordings and transcriptions of all events, plus participate via text, audio, and/or video.
Connected
Although we're not in-person, we design to connect people together constantly in meetings and sessions.
Sustainable
Virtual convening lessens our impact through travel (and therefore, emissions and costs).
94%
stated our virtual conference (2024) was better than, or the best they’ve attended.
100%(!)
said they'd attend the conference again.
The Conference to Restore Humanity is one of the few conferences I’ve been to that lived up to its name. In every session the focus was not merely on “best practices” or “Science of Learning” or “Data data data.” The focus on the human, on how education is, as Dr. Immodino-Yang noted, about “developing human beings” was so refreshing and unabashed.
Everyone who spoke elevated the human centeredness of their practice above all else. And to have as many students as this conference had??? Who else should we really be paying attention to?
To leave a conference, especially a virtual one, with a feeling of joy and renewed vigor for this often taxing career is unexpected and welcome. Thank you.
I had no idea what to expect but the conference provided an inspiring abundance of kindred spirit educators who are doing the work of making the world better through humane educational experiences.
I learned so much about both theory and practice. The variety was delightful, with so much attention paid to the aesthetics and the experience of the participants, from music to graphics to videos to platforms. I have never attended anything quite this magical. But now I’m both tired and fired up!
Human Restoration Project is constantly pushing boundaries and exceeding expectations. They truly live into their mission to restore humanity - affording opportunities for the community to feel connecting to both each other and the ideas they share. Their latest conference left me in awe - their stamina to host and hold guests as partners in the work was deeply felt.
CTRH! 2025 tickets are $50 for 3 days of programming (July 21-23, 2025). Your ticket goes toward paying our speakers and event hosts and digital hosting fees. Join our giving campaign to support the work further with merch! Parity pricing and scholarships are available, with an application opening closer to the event.
Invoicing and bulk purchase orders can be inquired at connect@humanrestorationproject.org.
