TED Talks: Education Revolution Premieres Tuesday, September 13, 2016, on PBS

SAN FRANCISCO - Hosted by best-selling author and comedian Baratunde Thurston and actress, musician and activist actress Sara Ramirez, TED Talks: Education Revolution explores new and innovative approaches to learning and teaching.

TED Talks: Education Revolution premieres Tuesday, September 13, 2016, 10:00-11:00 p.m. ET (check local listings) as part of SPOTLIGHT EDUCATION week on PBS and is funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), as part of "American Graduate: Let's Make It Happen," a public media initiative to help communities ensure more students graduate ready for college and careers.

Filmed live at New York's The Town Hall theater, these new TED Talks brings together a wide range of cutting edge thinkers, performers, entrepreneurs, and educators. Featured speakers include:

Entrepreneur Sal Khan, the former hedge fund manager who went on to create the celebrated Khan Academy, shares new ideas about how we can transform classroom learning by giving students the tools they need to master concepts, which leads to character-building and heightened creativity; Author Julie Lythcott-Haims challenges parents to stop micromanaging their children and focus on creating lives centered more on love than conventional concepts of achievement and career success; Dr. Victor Rios, author and educator, recounts how a dedicated and empowering teacher rescued him from a life of poverty and prison.

Acclaimed performer Anna Deavere Smith recently traveled across the country to find out why so many children living in poverty wind up out of school and in the criminal justice system. In her unique theatrical style, Smith presents the powerful words of two young people she met during her visit to Baltimore in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray.

Nadia Lopez, founder and principal of the Mott Hall Bridges Academy, located in one of the most underserved and violent neighborhoods of Brooklyn, shares how her school helped transform struggling students into eager scholars with newfound hope and purpose.

TED Talks: Education Revolution features performances by singer/songwriter Meshell Ndegeocelloand host Sara Ramirez, and three original short films produced by Independent Television Service (ITVS):

Modern Classroom, by Greg Whiteley, which proposes a radical rethinking of the traditional classroom model, largely unchanged since the Industrial Revolution; Freedom University, by Heather Courtney andAnayansi Prado, about an alternative college program in Georgia for undocumented students shut out of the state's university system; and Unconscious Bias, by Geeta Gandbhir and Perri Peltz, about how bias can sneak up on us when we least expect it.

TED Talks: Education Revolution is a co-production of TED and ITVS for PBS. TED Talks: Education Revolution is curated by Chris Anderson and Juliet Blake. The executive producer is Juliet Blake and Allen Kelman is the producer. TED content director is Kelly Stoetzel. Executive producers for ITVS are Tamara Gould and Sally Jo Fifer. TED Talks: Education Revolution is directed by Linda Mendoza. Funded by the CPB, this special is the third in a series of three TED Talks specials for public media in 2016. More information is available at pbs.org/tedtalks.

SPOTLIGHT EDUCATION is a week of primetime programs on PBS and WORLD Channel focused on this challenges facing America's education system and why many of our students are still failing. Starting Monday, Sept.12, PBS stations will lead a national dialogue on-air, online and across communities, and explore ideas and solutions to improve outcomes for all America's youth. Funding for these programs is provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting as part of the public media initiative American Graduate: Let's Make It Happen.