Harriett Ball

Harriett Ball, a teacher's teacher, writer, artist, entertainer, and motivator is a former Houston and Austin I.S.D. Elementary master teacher and counselor for over 20 years. She has been elected campus "Teacher of the Year" six times, holds the title of "Honorable Mention" in "The Top 10 Excellent Teachers of America" (a national competition sponsored by "Learning Magazine and the Oldsmobile Corporation), and is hailed as an outstanding presenter in institutions and school districts across the nation. She has created a unique technique of using multi-sensory, mnemonic teaching strategies that reach and teach "At Risk" students in their strongest learning mode.

Her awesome ability to inspire and train is evidenced in the results of thousands of elementary, middle, and high students and teachers in public schools across the nation and at over 52 nationally acclaimed KIPP Academies (Knowledge Is Power Program, grades K-8 college preparatory schools), which are named after her song. 'Knowledge Is Power'. The KIPP Academies are "the brainchild of Harriett Ball" as quoted by David Levin, co-founder of the KIPP Academies, who was trained to use Harriett's techniques for over 3 years before the first KIPP Academy became a reality.

Harriett has been showcased on 'The Early Show', 'BET', 'The Oprah Show' (twice), guest speaker on Houston, TX television news channels and talk-shows, and a satellite radio talk-show. She has been featured in 'The Washington Post', 'USA Today', 'The Houston Post', 'The Houston Press', ''New York Times', and several other newspapers across the nation. She holds a 'Harriett Ball Day Proclamation' from the City Mayor of Galveston, TX, and in honor for the work she had done to improve students' state test performance in Galveston and has been honored at 'The Apollo Theater' by David Levin for her contribution to the KIPP Academies. She is featured as one of the top presenters in the book, "Teachers, The Enlightened, the Excellent, The Extraordinary" by John Yow, which can be found in every Barnes & Nobles bookstore. She is a repeat presenter/trainer for KIPP Academies, Teach For America Corps, C-PAL of Texas Southern University, CDL (Center for Dev. Learning), VLI (Visionary Leadera Institute), BAEO (Black Alliance for Educ. Options), multiple national and state associations of education, (i.e. NABSE), Claflin University, and numerous public and charter schools (Elem-HS) in Texas, Georgia, New York, Indiana, Illinois, Nevada, Arizona, Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, Oregon, Kentucky, California, S.Carolina, Florida, Missouri, Kansas, and Michigan.

Harriett's keynotes center around empowering the audience to step up to the plate to make a difference in "under-taught" students' lives--not accepting excuses, constantly learning multiple, optional methods to reach and teach each student, and the need to better prepare education majors with teaching strategies that reach every student in their strongest learning mode before they leave colleges/universities; and on-going training for newly hired teachers in how to teach 21st century students who thrive on excitement, movement, rhyming, and other AVTK modes of learning; and how we can best help teachers who are on 'growth plans'; and how to significantly close the learning gap within 1 or 2 years, instead of the projected year of 2030. Everyone need to expand the methods traditionally used to teach and learn how to detect problems in learning a process and knowing how to correct and protect learners from being ridiculed for lack of knowledge.