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Ex Fabula: Education Matters

Art Montes
Storyteller Tony Anderson

Education has been front page news since the beginning of 2017. From the controversial appointment of the new United States Secretary of Education to Tuesday’s Wisconsin Primary for State Superintendent of Public Instruction, all eyes are on education. This week we’re featuring stories about the importance of educatio - not from those making decisions at the top, but the importance of those in the classrooms. Educators, we salute you.

In November of 2016 Tony Anderson began his “It’s Complicated” story on the night his son Evan was born. He and Evan had a lovely heart to heart and Tony explained the endless possibilities Evan’s life would offer. However as Evan became a toddler, Tony and his wife began to notice that he was not communicating, verbalizing or making eye contact the way others his age were. An Autism diagnosis was soon to follow and Evan’s parents were forced to reimagine the dreams they had for their son and who to turn to for help.

Credit Ex Fabula
Storyteller Susannah Bartlow.

The second powerful story comes from a January 2017 Ex Fabula Fellows event, “White Fragility.” Susannah Bartlow, the Director of the Gender and Sexuality and Resource Center at a local catholic school, received a phone call from her boss on a Sunday night asking about the subject of a mural the students had chosen and created. She knew that this was no simple question.

When Susannah was then asked if covering the mural would be a problem, she realized that there was only one answer to the question and many repercussions to a mural created by the students.

Do you have a student or a youth that tells great stories? Ever wish Ex Fabula wasn’t for those 18 and older? Well, we’ve got an event for your youth! TXT U L8TR: A Storytelling & Spoken Word Workshop for Teens. Have a story? We want to hear it!