who played Captain Kirk on the original Star Trek series,

to kiss 5000 people

at a Star Trek convention.

(Laughter)

Now back then, Star Trek was probably

the most important thing in my life.

And like a lot of psychologists and sociologists at the time,

who were trying to understand the Star Trek phenomenon,

I wanted to understand it too.

I wanted to understand why this show

and why these characters were so profoundly important to me

that I would be willing to publicly humiliate myself as a 15 year old.

Well, I've given it a lot of thought and I've come to the conclusion

that the reason why Star Trek has so many millions of fans

is because of the future that it depicts.

A future in which we've solved our earthly problems.

Our nations are at peace,

our planet is alive and thriving,

we're no longer myopic, and mean spirited,

we're part of the United Federation of Planets, -

(Laughter)

and we're actually explorers without being conquerors.

That vision has actually kept me going

when I felt my most despondent about the state of the world,

which is easy to do, in the face of global warming,

and escalating world wide slavery,

and alarming rates of species extinction,

and war, and poverty, and genocide,

and institutionalized forms of oppression and cruelty

towards both people and animals in a host of industries.

It is very hard to imagine that we can actually create that Star Trek future.

It seems so "pie in the sky".

And yet, I've spent my whole adult life working toward that future.

And I've discovered the solution,

and I'm going to share it with you today.

There's actually just one system that we just need to tweak a little bit,

and if we do that, we can solve every problem in the world.

And that key system is schooling.

Now, there's a deafening silence in the room.

(Laughter)

Because I realize that the word schooling is probably

the most uninspiring word in the English language.

But that's because we have a very small perception

of what schooling can be.

If we ask people, "What's the purpose of schooling?",

most of them are going to say something like this,

"Well, it's to provide the basics of verbal, mathematical and scientific literacy,

so that our graduates can find jobs and compete in the global economy."

So let's do a thought experiment.

Let's imagine that every child graduates from high school,

and does so, having passed their "No Child Left Behind" test with flying colors.

And let's imagine further that every single one of them

is able to find a decent job, paying a livable wage,

or go to college and find such a job,

or go to college and graduate school and find such a job,

so that we have 100% employment.

Would we think that we have been successful in our goals for schooling?

I think that most of us would say, "Yes".

The problem is that many of those graduates,

would go on to perpetuate and perhaps even exacerbate

some of those problems that I just mentioned earlier.

The problem is that that purpose is too small,

and it's outmoded for today's world.

We need a bigger vision for the purpose of schooling.

And I believe that it should be this:

that we provide every student with the knowledge,

the tools and the motivation to be

conscientious choice makers and engaged change-makers

for a restored and healthy and humane world for all.

Or another way of putting it, I believe that we need to graduate

a generation of solutionaries.

(Applause)

Now, some people have asked, "Well, is this good for kids?

And is it really fair to them, to burden them with the responsibility

to fix all the problems that generations before them have created?"

Well, to answer those questions, I want to tell you

some stories about my experience as a humane educator,

somebody who teaches about the interconnected issues of human rights,

and environmental preservation,

and animal protection.

I became a humane educator back in 1987

when I was looking for a summer job.

And I found this program that was offering week-long courses

to middle school students in Philadelphia.

So that's were I taught my first humane education courses.

And I watch in amazement as these kids were transformed

over the course of a week.

In one case, over-night.

I taught about product testing on animals one day,

and I talked about how soaps and lotions and oven cleaners

are squeezed into the eyes of conscious rabbits,

and forced fed them in quantities that kill.

And a boy from the class went home that night

and he made his own homemade leaflets about product testing.

Well, he came into class the next morning

and he show them to me and he asked if he can hand them out.

I said, sure, I thought he wanted to hand them out to his fellow classmates.

He wanted to hand them out on the street.

So while the rest of us were having lunch,

he was on the Philadelphia street corner

handing out his leaflets.

He'd become an activist over-night.

Actually, several of the kids in that class, became activists.

Two of them formed a Philadelphia area wide student group

that went on to win awards for their great work.

Well, that was the summer I realized

that I'd found my life's work as a humane educator,

and I went on to form a humane education program

where I brought presentations and courses into schools.

And there was one school, a public high school,

where I did an after-school course.

And there was a boy in the class named Mike.

He was a senior. He always sat near the front.

He was really smart. He always played devil's advocate,

which I loved because I want my students

to be critical thinkers about all else.

In fact, I often begin presentations

by telling students, "Don't believe a word I say."

Well, I still worried about Mike.

I worried whether or not I was really reaching him.

Because he never had an emotional response

to any of the issues that we were discussing,

and there were some pretty intense issues.

Well, on the last day of class I decided to do

a rather unconventional activity

called the "council of all beings",

where I invited the students to become

through their imaginations, another being,

whether a part of nature or another animal or another person,

and then just speak as this being,

and talk about what's happening to them,

and talk about what they want to change,

and share their wisdom.

So I was really worried.

How is Mike is going to react to this kind of touchy-feely activity?

But my fears were totally unfounded.

Mike had become the ocean.

And when he spoke, poetry just poured out of his mouth.

I was stunned.

When the activity was over, that was the end of the course.

We were saying our goodbyes and Mike said,

"Thank you, Zoe. When I look back at high school,

this is what I'm gonna remember."

So yes, I believe this form of education is good for kids.

Is it fair to them?

Well, to answer that question I want to tell you another story.

A couple of years ago, I was asked to be the speaker

at the National Honor Society Induction at a local high school.

And I did an activity with the audience called "true price",

in which we look at an everyday object

like bottled water or a fast food cheese burger,

and ask what is the true price of this item

on ourselves as individuals,

on other people, on other species, and on the environment?

Well, that particular day I did "true price" with a T-shirt.

And I'm gonna do a little bit of this activity with you.

So, what are the effects both positive or negative

of this item on me as a consumer, on other people,

on animals and on the environment?

Well, questions like those could be somebody's dissertation.

So to answer them today I'm just going to scratch the surface.

Well, the first thing I need to do to answer those questions

is look to the item itself.

So I'm gonna look at the label and see what it has to tell me.

Well, I found out when I looked at this label that is a 100% cotton.

It's made in China.

And I learned how to launder it.

I also learned that it's dry cleanable,

in case I would like to spend 6 dollars to clean my T-shirt.

So, that doesn't tell me very much, I'm gonna have to dig a little bit deeper.

And if I do some research into cotton and cotton T-shirts,

I'm gonna find out that cotton is a crop

that is heavily sprayed with pesticides,

many of which are toxic and we know they're toxic

because of the incredibly cruel tests

that were done on animals to test them.

We also discover that many of those pesticides

end up polluting our soil and our waterways.

Now, if I find out a little bit more about cotton

I will come across some information

that it's estimated that a third of cotton is produced in Uzbekistan

where by another estimate,

there are 1 million children working in those fields as slaves.

Now that cotton, after it's grown,

has to be turned into cloth and then it has to be dyed

'cause it didn't get to be this red color out of the ground.

So if I do some research on the dye

I discover that many of those dyes are also toxic

and also wind up in our water stream

because about 30% of the dye doesn't adhere to the cotton,

and it winds up in the water.

Then, of course the cloth has to go somewhere to be turned into a T-shirt.

We know that it went to China,

so if we did a little research

on Chinese garment factories

we would discover that many of them

are essentially sweatshops,

where people are working exceedingly long hours

under terrible working conditions.

And then finally it's going to be transported using lots of fossil fuels

so that I can buy it.

So, those are just some of the effects and some of the negative effects.

The positive ones are a little bit easier to see.

We know that even if there was slave labor involved in this

it certainly did contribute to a lot of people having jobs,

and it's produced in a way that's inexpensive,

so that I can get lots of these

in all different colors and shapes and styles,

some of which might look cute on me

which might make me feel good about myself.

So there are some positive effects.

Now, we ask two other important questions in "true price".

We ask, "What alternatives would do

more good and less harm in this conventional product,

and what are the systems that would need to be transformed

in order to make those alternatives ubiquitous?"

Well, after the talk was over, a colleague of mine

asked one of the inductees

what she thought of it?

And she said that it made her really angry because,

this is a quote, "We should've been learning this since kindergarten".

I agree. So in answer to the question,

"Do I think that it's fair

to provide this form of education to our students?"

I actually think it's unfair not to provide the knowledge and the skills

to our students, to our children

so that they can be solutionaries for a better world.

Now, let's say we were to actually embrace this larger purpose for schooling.

What would our schools look like?

Well, first of all, any of these objects

could be a course in a school.

And would be a course that would be relevant

to our students lives and their future