Compelling Film Content for Many Learning Environments
Community Classroom brings innovative media resources to educators in high schools, community colleges, and other youth-serving organizations. In tandem with our flagship community engagement program Community Cinema, our goal is to connect educators and students with fresh content, information, resources, and opportunities for learning, engagement, and action.
Community Classroom provides educational video modules drawn from ITVS’s acclaimed documentary films and pairs them with standards-based lesson plans, activities, and other interactive content. We select Community Classroom films from among those aired on the Emmy award-winning PBS series Independent Lens and produced through ITVS International’s Global Perspectives Project.
Our resources connect 21st Century students with video content from independent filmmakers who share new perspectives about a diverse range of people, places, moments in history, and history-in-the-making. Through these authentic stories, young and adult learners alike will develop a deeper understanding of vital social issues in their own backyards and around the world.
Flexible, Free, and Easy-to-Use Curricula
Film modules and lesson plans are designed to be accessible and appropriate for a variety of learning environments. Students and participants can complete each activity in one class period, or teachers can combine multiple activities to create a unit lasting one to two weeks. While developed for the high school and community college levels, lesson plans can be easily adapted for other grade levels and learning needs. At home, students can complete assignments through free streaming video on this website, and access many of our full-length programs online.
Innovation and Expertise
Community Classroom resources are created with guidance from nationally recognized educational organizations, such as the National Council for the Social Studies, the National Council of Teachers of English, the National State Teachers of the Year, the National Association for Media Literacy Education, the American Association of Community Colleges, PBS Teachers, and the KQED Education Network. We collaborate with experienced editors and curriculum writers to create film content tied to each curriculum’s learning goals, giving students factual information, context for contemporary and historical events, and personal stories that help them connect with the subject matter.
Community Classroom Advisors
Donelle Blubaugh, Director of Education, PBS
Donelle’s team works with PBS producers and stations to build high quality resources that address critical curriculum needs and meet today’s instructional challenges. Donelle represents PBS Education on the PBS KIDS and General Audience cross-disciplinary teams that are responsible for the online and on-air content proposal approval process at PBS. In addition, she works with the SVP of Education and senior education staff at PBS to develop and implement strategies that strengthen PBS’s commitment to the professional growth of educators and to the knowledge and skill of America’s children and youth.
Wendell C. Bourne, Jr., National Council for the Social Studies
Wendell has been an educator for more than 35 years. He is a former middle school social studies teacher who has taught, written, and developed curriculum for African-American and American history, social studies, multicultural education, and diversity issues. He served as the statewide content specialist for history and social science for the Massachusetts Department of Education (1997-99), and has taught graduate education courses at the University of Massachusetts-Boston and Lesley University. Bourne served on the board of directors for the National Council for the Social Studies (2006-09), and was president of the Massachusetts Council for the Social Studies (2003-04). He served as the K-12 coordinator of multicultural curriculum and programs for the Cambridge (MA) Public Schools (2000-06), and is currently the district’s K-12 coordinator for history and social science.
Jenny Bradbury, Content Manager, PBS Teachers
Jenny collaborates with general primetime television and Web producers to develop and distribute high quality teaching and learning resources that meet the needs of today’s educators and students. She also produces PBS Teachers’s monthly webinar series and edits the Media Infusion blog, both of which promote media and technology integration in education. Jenny holds a bachelor's degree in Public Policy from Brown University and a master's degree in English Education from Teachers College, Columbia University. Over the past 10 years, she has taught high school English and humanities in Brooklyn, New York, New Delhi, India, and Hadley, Massachusetts.
Kara Clayton, National Association for Media Literacy Education
Kara has worked as a classroom media studies teacher in the South Redford Public School District, just west of Detroit, Michigan, since 1995. Prior to that she spent 10 years in both broadcast and corporate television production. While her passion is media literacy, she enjoys working with young media makers to help them develop an appreciation for the art of media making. Kara is a founding member of the National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) and served on its Board of Directors for three years, she reviews articles for the Journal of Media Literacy, and is the department chair for the Communication Technology Department at Thurston High School where she has been teaching for 15 years.
Maxine Einhorn, KQED Education Network
Maxine is a credentialed teacher and has worked as a tenured instructor and department manager in colleges in London for more than 20 years. She has taught film studies, communications, and media literacy, and has worked as a researcher on independent film productions in London and San Francisco. Maxine currently supervises the Media Literacy Project at KQED, working with educators in colleges, adult schools, and universities utilizing KQED/PBS media and online resources to enrich curricula.
Joe Fatheree, National Teachers of the Year Association
Joe is an award-winning educator and filmmaker. His television work has been seen on PBS and the Documentary Channel. In February, he was named the recipient of the NEA’s National Award for Teaching Excellence. In 2007, he was named the Illinois Teacher of the Year. His groundbreaking work in the field of multimedia has been the subject of a number of national articles, and he serves as a board member for Advance Illinois an educational policy organization. As a producer, he has received three Mid-America Emmy awards for producing and writing.
Ken C. Garcia-Gonzales, Dean of Multicultural Life at the Urban School of San Francisco
Ken is a veteran teacher and educator from the Bay Area. He has been working in education for more than 15 years, with an emphasis in ethnic studies and multicultural education. His past work experience includes teaching abroad in Japan; completing an educational service program through AmeriCorps; teaching ethnic studies and history at Berkeley High; and managing the Bay Area Mosaic Project at KQED Public Television. In addition, he has presented more than 100 workshops on ethnic studies content and has worked closely with organizations such as the Center for Asian American Media and Facing History and Ourselves. He is currently the dean of Multicultural Life at the Urban School of San Francisco working as both an administrator and ethnic studies teacher.
Dr. Carole N. Lester, American Association of Community Colleges
Carole is currently the dean of instruction for Academic Enrichment Programs at Richland College. Programs in Academic Enrichment include Honors, Global Studies, Fast Track, Learning Communities, Mind-Body Health, Peace Studies, and Service Learning. In addition to her administrative duties, she teaches history and humanities in learning community classes and online. She is a past president of the Southwestern Division of the Community College Humanities Association (CCHA). She has served as Richland's project director for three CCHA and National Endowment for three Humanities grant projects. Carole was named National Distinguished Humanities Educator for 2009-2010.
Chris Runde, Bay Area Video Coalition’s Next Generation Program
Chris has been teaching digital audio and music production for the Bay Area Video Coalition's Next Gen youth programs since 2007. Working in a variety of in-school and after-school settings, he has worked with students ages 12 to 21. Since April 2008, he has been the lead instructor for BAVC's Digital Pathways Advanced Audio class, an after-school program that prepares high school-age youth for potential career tracks in the audio industry. In addition, he has been writing standards-based curricula for teaching audio and music production in a variety of educational settings.
Dave Yanofsky, Director of Media and Youth Development for ConnectEd California
Dave got his start in radio, reporting in Budapest, as well as for American Public Media’s Marketplace. After returning to the U.S., he produced his first feature film, Poetic License. Aired nationally on PBS, the film captures the emergence of spoken word poetry as a powerful form of self-expression for teenage youth. He then went to become the executive director of Just Think, a media literacy nonprofit organization, where he produced a number of innovative curricular projects that focus on youth and storytelling, and that help educators integrate media into their classroom or afterschool workshop. Before coming to ConnectEd, Yanofsky was the program director for Uth TV, where he oversaw a staff of youth media makers and helped to produce Grind & Glory, a feature-length film that was shot and edited by a crew of teenagers.
Michael M. Yell, National Council of the Social Studies
Michael is a 7th grade social studies teacher in Hudson, Wisconsin. In his years of teaching he has received a number of honors including the National Council for the Social Studies’s 1998 National Social Studies Teacher of the Year award, and in 2003 received national board certification. Michael was elected president of the National Council for the Social Studies in 2008-9, and frequently works as a trainer and educational consultant.
