KEYNOTE: Overcoming the Odds: Lessons Learned From the School With No Name

Friday February 6, 2015
10:00 - 11:30 AM
Grand Ballroom

Powerful and dynamic, speaker Stacey Bess engages groups by sharing the story that changed her life as she taught and nurtured hundreds of underprivileged children. She speaks on the importance of service, mentorship and leadership, and overcoming adversity. Drawing on her fascinating and inspirational personal story - teaching homeless children in a small shed known as "The School with No Name" - she offers powerful insights and lessons that inspire audiences to become more involved in their own communities.

Presenters
Stacey Bess

Through ups and downs and personal struggles - Bess taught kindergarten through sixth grade for 11 years at The School with No Name, an experience that affected a profound change in the teacher as well as her students.  During that time she discovered that, by teaching and modeling love, self-worth, personal power, and courage, she could reach children with no homes and little hope, children who had previously been labeled "unteachable."  These children grew into living proof that Bess' methods work.  To inspire and motivate others with a passion for service, Bess penned the memoir "Nobody Don't Love Nobody", which was adapted into the April 2011 Hallmark Hall of Fame movie Beyond the Blackboard starring Emily VanCamp.
theme:
Leadership
audience:
Topics:
at-risk populations, response to intervention