The Community Speaker Series promotes district-wide learning about education, child development, wellness, and parenting. It is open and free to all members of the K-12 learning community.
The intention of the series is to encourage proactive parenting that supports children’s and adolescents’ social and emotional development as well as their academic achievement.
Through this series, District 86 and District 181 enlist top experts to inform and inspire our community as a means to enrich the school-family partnership that undergirds the education of our students.
Growing Up In Public:
Coming of Age in a Digital World
Wednesday, October 18, 2023
9:30am – 11:00am
7:00pm - 8:30pm
In Person at The Community House
If you’ve ever said, “I’m so glad my teenage years weren’t shared for the world to see,” this talk is for you! With social media and constant connection, the boundaries of privacy for children are stretched thin. Heitner shows parents how to help tweens and teens navigate boundaries, identity, privacy, and reputation in their digital world.
Growing Up in Public empowers parents to cut through the overwhelm to connect with their kids, recognize how to support them, and help them figure out who they are when everyone is watching.
8 Setbacks That Can Make a Child a Success
Wednesday, January 31, 2024
9:30am – 11:00am
7:00pm - 8:30pm
In Person at The Community House
Every child messes up, sometimes in ways that seem sure to wreck their futures: a bad report card, poor sportsmanship, underaged drinking. These are tough moments for parent and child alike, often complicated by the fear that the misstep is also an indictment of our parenting. But what each of these “fails” has in common for our kids is the precious silver lining of a chance for character building and developing more grit—if we help them process their mistakes well. Icard offers specific and invaluable advice about what to say, what not to say, and what to do to help children in eight categories of tense situations.
Who Gets In and Why: A Year Inside College Admissions
Wednesday, April 24, 2024
7:00pm - 8:30pm
In Person at the Hinsdale Central Auditorium
It’s the question on the minds of teenagers and their parents everywhere: how do colleges select their freshman class? For an entire admissions cycle, Selingo was embedded in three admissions offices and followed a group of high-school seniors through the process as well as players behind the scenes, including the marketers, the financial aid consultants, and the rankers.
Selingo dispels the entrenched notions of how to compete and win at the admissions game, reveals why families have much to gain by broadening their notion of what qualifies as a “good” college, and explains how the Covid-19 pandemic will impact admissions in the long run.