ACME Summit 2008

On June 5th, the day before Free Press' National Conference for Media Reform, the national leadership of the Action Coalition for Media Education (ACME) will conduct a special one day teach-in. You will learn a host of useful media literacy education 2.0 tips, tools, techniques, and strategies. Walk away with the knowledge, skills and civic spirit desperately needed to challenge big media...and win! ACME offers the most accessible methods for leading average people to an appreciation of what they don't know about censorship in our culture. Use our new and expanded tools of media literacy education (2.0) to motivate citizens, parents and students in ways that turn them into media reform activists who will be able to motivate people toward media reform or any cause.

ACME is a national media education nonprofit run entirely by citizen/teacher volunteers, a grassroots coalition that takes NO FUNDING from Big Media corporations and their subsidiaries. ACME's unique approach to media education 2.0 involves teaching citizens of all ages how to more effectively access, analyze, and produce media. ACME's success stems from an innovative, research-based and interactive approach to teaching media education skills, knowledge, and activism in an engaging way. Our coalition is led by veteran teachers with years of successful classroom experience working with students of all ages.

The first 50 people to register for ACME day will receive a multimedia package that includes their choice of a free DVD from the Media Education Foundation, Robert McChesney’s latest book, The Communication Revolution: Critical Junctures and the Future of Media, a DVD with dozens of pages of handouts, workshop clips and much more.

The price is $79.00. To register visit our ACME Summit 2008 registration page.

To make lodging reservations for your stay please visit http://www.freepress.net/conference/=lodging08 for special discount lodging options.

The ACME Summit takes place in the Hyatt Regency hotel. It is located next to the convention center. For more information, email Bob McCannon at mccannon@flash.net or call (505) 839-9702. We hope you’ll stay to attend The National Conference for Media Reform June 6-8th. Visit www.freepress.net/conference for more information.

Program: June 5th ACME Teach-In Schedule

8:00 - 9:00 -- Registration

9:00 - 10:00 -- Keynote

Media Education 2.0 - An Overview of the General Principles of Media Education (Dr. Rob Williams; ACME Co-President)

We live in the midst of the most powerful media culture in world history - a time of tremendous promise and great peril. Join Action Coalition for Media Education (ACME at www.acmecoalition.org) co-founder Dr. Rob Williams (www.robwilliamsmedia.com) for a fun, interactive and provocative multimedia exploration of our 21st century media culture's pros and cons, and how media education can lead citizens of all ages to a deeper understanding of our media-related dilemmas. Together, we will answer two questions: What is media education 2.0, and how can we harness ACME-style media education's general principles for use in our classrooms and communities, reforming our media culture and moving us towards a more just and democratic world? Handouts, multimedia, and fun in abundance.

Workshops: 10:15 – 12:00

Workshop One

“Using the new breed of documentary videos to promote media reform and social change” (Kendra Hodgson, Operations Manager & Marketing Director, Media Education Foundation)

Media education can help people understand the stories of our
culture and give them the tools to engage in sustainable societal change. Because we live in a media-saturated culture, it is essential that we critically analyze and utilize the messages put forth by this system, which is owned and controlled by just a few multinational corporations. Anyone involved in social change needs to use media education to educate and inform, and a wealth of video tools now exist to augment this purpose

In this workshop, we'll use clips from videos produced by the Media
Education Foundation to help people think critically about the stories put
forth by the commercial media system with special attention to messages
about democracy, environment, consumption, justice and representations of
race and class. Attendees will also learn how to represent and promote their own issues as we utilize media education skills and approaches to explore the essential role that media education can play in advancing social change work.

Workshop Two

“Technology for Media Reform: This Is Not Your Mother's Classroom” (Sheryl Rivera and Adam Kenner: technology and media savants at Horace Mann School in New York and founders of ACME NYC)

Effective and compelling education in the 21st Century demands a media-rich learning environment. As we work toward educating a media-saturated generation, we need to expand the art of teaching using innovative, "good media" techniques. Fortunately, today's digital technology puts professional-grade media tools within easy reach and a vast library of media is already available from countless internet sources. Educational Technology experts Sheryl Rivera and Adam Kenner will show you how to use cutting-edge technology to create classes and presentations that will engage, educate and entertain media activists, students and audiences of all ages.

Workshop Three

“Turning big media’s predilection for poison into positive energy for media reform” (Dr. Rob Williams; ACME Co-President)

Instead of advocating what Founding Father Ben Franklin called "health, wealth, and wisdom" for our kids, classrooms, and communities, Big Media's message and stories too often advocate "disease, debt, and ignorance." In this ACME media education 2.0 workshop, we'll take an interactive and solutions-oriented approach to challenging Big Media's "health" messages and issues. How does Big Media censor health-related information and use media to peddle alcohol, tobacco and other addictive products to our kids and in our communities? How can we turn Big Media's messages against themselves and promote media reform? Media reform can defeat the large for-profit multinationals, helping young people, parents and heath professionals to make healthier choices about how they choose to spend their money, time, money, and energy? Come to this workshop and find out! Handouts and fun provided.

Lunch – 12:00 – 1:15 – On your own

Keynote Two -- 1:15 - 2:15

Doing media education/ media literacy for reform - what the research indicates are successful and unsuccessful strategies” (Bob McCannon; ACME Co-President)

ACME Co-Founder Bob McCannon (www.bobmccannon.org) will demonstrate his internationally renowned style of media education and describe techniques that today’s research indicates are successful. Activists, you can use these toola to turn average, busy people into media reform activists! YOU can give personal and tangible meaning to Bob’s famous axiom, “Media reform requires media education.” He will give crucial tips for success, based upon his teaching ml/me at all levels, training thousands of teachers and his forthcoming review of media literacy research (to be published in the college text, Children, Adolescents and Media, 2nd edition, July, 2008). Bob will provide examples of which methods and content work and, unfortunately, how the best intentioned people can fail. He will also show examples of student-produced media from organization for whom he consults. Handouts and thrills galore will be provided.

Workshops: 2:30 – 4:00

Workshop Four

“Persuasion is as old as language, but this accessible group of skills has never been more critical for students, teachers, parents, citizens, media producers and media reformers.” (Bob McCannon; ACME Co-President)

Persuasion can be reduced to a “language,” a set of specific skills. Shakespeare actually used all of these in Marc Anthony’s funeral speech; so did Lincoln, Churchill and, even, George W. Bush (badly). Bob will take you through a detailed, hands-on seminar that teaches how human beings persuade one another. Since he developed this lesson forty years ago, this body of specific media skills has been incorporated into hundreds of published media curricula. Learn how to empower those who seek to understand politics, advertising and, even, their friends. More importantly, learn how to be a more effective media producer and communicator. The language of persuasion is your ticket to greater personal freedom and motivational power. Abraham Lincoln said, “Bob’s language of persuasion is the one thing that got me through the Civil War.” Handouts and soul-shaking epiphanies provided.

Workshop Five

“Using big media’s exploitation of children to motivate parents and others toward media reform” (Josh Golin, Associate Director, Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood)

A media system designed to serve advertiser's interests and not the public interest is bad for everyone, but it takes a particularly hard toll on children. Corporate marketing is a factor in many of the key problems facing children today, including childhood obesity, eating disorders, youth violence, precocious irresponsible sexuality rampant materialism, and the erosion of children's creative play. In this workshop, we'll examine how a combination of deregulation and new technologies has given corporations unfettered access to children and the latest techniques used by marketers to make an end-run around parents to sell children on anything and everything. We'll then explore ways of mobilizing parents, not only to fight back against their children's corporate abusers, but to become activists for policy change and media reform.

Workshop Six: “To Be Announced”

Reception/networking: 4:00 – 5:30 (cash bar)