Drew Carey, a native cleveland-o-phile, has partnered with Reason TV to do a series on Cleveland .  It's worth seeing.  Episode 2 is on fixing the education .  They go to Oakland to look at what's been done there that has worked in a demographic similar to inner-city Cleveland and then go to Citizen's Academy , a charter school in Cleveland that is making a difference.

There are caveats - these schools have much more autonomy than non-charter public schools, which we know, and the teachers have much more autonomy as well - partly because of how the schools are run and partly because they are not part of the teachers' union.  While their pay is less than in the public school, their autonomy is increased - which just goes to show that money is not always the primary motivator (read Dan Pink's DRiVE ) 

Yesterday was Cleveland's first TEDx event and it was incredible.  Organized by  Hallie Bram and Eric Kogelschatz,  the event was a total success - despite the snow that closed down virtually every school system in NE Ohio and snarled roads.  Check out the event and the speakers.  On a gray snowy day, it was one of the most uplifting, exciting, encouraging events in Cleveland in a long time - there is so much passion and creativity,  invention and innovation going on that you would wonder why someone is paying the press (Forbes??) to give us such bad 'press'!  The range of speakers talking about what they are doing in CLE - from healthcare innovation to design and fashion to urban renewal to advanced energy and electric vehicle s to hi-tech/art to cooking to finding unique ways to give back (by lawyers no less!) shows the depth and breadth of talent, knowledge and opportunity here.  Who knew that outside of NYC, CLE was the fashion mecca decades ago?

So, please, take a look at the TEDxCLE site (www.tedxcle.com ) and make sure you can get to it next year because it will be sold out again.  And keep an eye on Cleveland, very very cool things are happening...on the North Coast.