Dispatches from the Transatlantic Educators Dialogue (TED) Alumni Program 2020: Magdalena Brzezińska and Mirko Labbri

This blog post is co-written by Magdalena Brzezińska and Mirko Labbri, participants in this year’s TED Alumni program. Magdalena teaches English at WSB Banking University in Poznan, Poland. Mirko teaches middle school math and science in Treviso, Italy.

Why Taking Part in the Transatlantic Educators Dialogue (TED) is Life-changing

By Magdalena Brzezińska

Back in 2017, when I took part in the Transatlantic Educators Programme for the first time, I was in a much different professional situation. I used to be an English instructor at a local Youth Community Center, teaching extracurricular classes to teens. Nowadays, taking part in the Alumni Program, I am an instructor and lecturer at the WSB Banking University in Poznan, Poland, and I still find the program very relevant and worthwhile. My experience proves that TED is so enriching and versatile, it’s practically for everyone. Every educator, no matter what institution they are working for, and irrespectively of the subject and age group they teach, will find topics and issues of interest and will feel included, respected and given a chance to grow and develop, both as a teacher/administrator and as a person.

Also, TED has a huge added value. It lets educators bond and make friends for life. Many teachers I met while I was taking part in the program are still in regular touch with me, and some of them even got involved in the annual international literary and artistic projects I curate. What helps facilitate such amazing interactions and friendships is the division of a relatively large group of participants into smaller ones for group projects. 

In the regular TED program, for example, my team discussed building safe spaces, inclusion, and approaches to violence and bullying, a topic that is always timely.  The group, made up of five educators from Greece, Poland, and the United States, worked on a shared Google PPT file to describe the situation in their countries and to offer practical solutions and tools to build safe spaces and inclusive classrooms and to curb/eliminate bullying, including one of students with special educational needs and disabilities. Within the project, I focused on the bully and on taking the proactive approach: teaching empathy. 

In the Alumni program, my group, made up of six educators from Finland, Greece, Italy, Poland, and the United States, initially embarked on a peace-focused project. We wanted our students to record short video-responses that would answer the question: “What does peace mean to you?” My team was planning to come up with lesson plans that would feature the recorded videos and make them a starting point for similar projects. Sadly, the pandemic, which caught everyone by surprise, made us revise our initial plans. Right now, we are shifting towards creating a blog where both teachers and students could find solace and inner peace in these dark and surreal times. Also, if we manage to find some student volunteers, we would like them to express how they feel in the world that is no longer the one we used to know and understand.

What should not go unnoticed and what the participants really appreciate about TED is also top-notch moderation, with a very competent and diplomatic moderator who is always in the background, treats educators with respect, empathy and care, and also skillfully manages their group work and individual presentations and always makes sure that everyone has a chance to speak their mind.

TED from a Mixed Italian Perspective

By Mirko Labbri

I was born in Switzerland to Italian parents who moved back to Italy when I was seven years old. My grandmother had a Swiss husband, and they lived there all their life. I am accustomed to the best and worst of both countries. I speak Italian, French, and English, and I am trying to learn some others without much success. I had the chance to get a taste of the U.S. (California) and the U.K. when I spent a year in each country during my undergraduate and graduate years, respectively.

Joining TED from this perspective is a bit like coming back to all these homes, having a peek into others and putting my work as a teacher and a teachers’ trainer into a much larger perspective. 

For people like me, who spend most of their energy on the technical aspects of their work, it is also a way to define the feeling of being part of a community of professionals and dedicated human beings. 

The whole setting is very well organized and planned, and it gives a framework for groups to work on projects and activities. While the original TED program was more focused on the participants and on understanding and sharing their teaching and classroom activities, the TED Alumni program takes a more project-based approach that indirectly involves students. Teachers collaborate to offer projects to their classes and their schools that are then shared within this larger and global virtual community.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the TED Alumni program was quick to mutate into a unique experience of support during a crisis. Remaining focused on the program’s primary objectives helped provide a feeling and sense of purpose within the larger context.