"For every roadblock you experience, there is a successful detour or alternate route. You need to be positive and help people solve their problems. The most successful leaders are the ones with the greatest number of viable alternatives."


  Colin Powell

Invitation for Applications: Better Blogging: Skills and Tools to Increase Impact

8:30 am – 4:30 pm February 3rd, 2012
Sofitel, Washington, D.C.

Bellwether Education Partners, a national nonprofit organization, is pleased to announce Better Blogging: Skills and Tools to Increase Impact, a new-media training event designed to help education bloggers improve their quality, reach, and impact.

The proliferation of blogging and social media provides exciting new venues for individuals, as well as for policy and advocacy organizations, to reach wider audiences and amplify their work and ideas. At the same time, not all blogs or online sites are equal. Some receive thousands of daily visitors while others see a few hundred or less.

The discrepancy is not just a function of quality. It arises because many blogs fail to take advantage of the full range of strategies and best practices the blogging platform offers. Meanwhile, other blogs have great ideas and fresh voices, but are not consistently presented in a readable, engaging, and accessible way.

At Bellwether, we believe that a vibrant marketplace of ideas and a lively but respectful debate is a key part of improving our schools. That’s why we’re sponsoring a free one-day seminar featuring national experts to provide tools and training for bloggers in the education sector. This is not a seminar about policy or pedagogical issues. Rather, the goal of this training is to build both the tactical and writing skills of participants, enabling them to make more effective use of new media to elevate their various education ideas and messages.

Bellwether will select participants for this seminar through an application process (Click to download the application in Microsoft Word.) Applicants will be selected based on ability to benefit and without regard to point-of-view or any partisan or organizational affiliation. Anyone whose blog is at least 50 percent education content (pre-K, elementary and secondary, higher education or lifelong learning) is encouraged to apply. We are particularly interested in receiving applications from teacher bloggers. There is no charge for the seminar and limited funding is available to defray travel costs for participants with demonstrated need.

Applications will be considered on a rolling basis, but the FINAL DEADLINE is 5pm Eastern Time on January 3, 2012.  Please note that space is limited and may fill up before the deadline. Please see below for further details about the training program and application.

This work is supported with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Program Details

This full-day event will be divided in to two parts. Participants will receive interactive training in specific skills and strategies related to effective writing through hands-on practice and coaching sessions with professional writers and bloggers, led by Carl Cannon, a Pulitzer Prize and Gerald R. Ford Prize (for distinguished presidential coverage)- winning journalist and the Washington Editor of RealClearPolitics. Cannon will be joined by veteran political blogger and columnist Matt Lewis, a senior contributor for the Daily Caller and regular co-host on Bloggingheads.TV, and Sommer Mathis, the editor of Atlantic Cities and former online editorial director of Washingtonian magazine.

Attendees will learn to:

  • Deepen their understanding of guidelines, strategies, and style for writing brief, reader-friendly commentary pieces;
  • Write ledes and headlines that attract and retain readers;
  • Understand the value of high-quality writing to effective blogging and communication;
  • Think critically about their own writing.

Participants will also learn from experts in the social and new media spaces, including Megan Carpentier, an editor and blogger formerly of Talking Points Memo, Jezebel, and Wonkette, and Jennifer Nedeau, who is an Associate Director, Public Relations of the Time Inc. News Group, where she helps to oversee digital communication strategy and assists with publicity for TIME, FORTUNE, MONEY, CNNMoney and LIFE brands. The discussion will center on tactics and strategies to increase blog readership, visibility, and engagement including:

  • Strategies for increasing blog readership and profile;
  • Effective use of Twitter, Facebook, and other social media to amplify your message and increase engagement;
  • Search-engine optimization;
  • How to track readership trends and use that data to improve.

The day will include a luncheon featuring Ezra Klein, the editor of Wonkblog and a columnist at the Washington Post, as well as a contributor to MSNBC and Bloomberg, for an off-the-record conversation about trends in media and communications, and what the changing environment means for blogs. On the evening of February 2, there will be an optional reception to provide social time for the group to get to know one another.

Bellwether can arrange discounted hotel rooms for attendees but participants are expected to pay their own travel costs. Limited financial aid is available.

We hope this event will attract a diverse group of individuals who care deeply about the future of education in the United States and who are eager to advance their ideas using blogging and social media. If you have additional questions please contact Rachael Brown at rachael@bellwethereducation.org.

You’ll find the application (a Microsoft Word document) attached by clicking here. Please complete the application and submit it by email to events@bellwethereducation.org.