"It is a great pleasure to be here with you. This is my first time in your remarkable country. Being here is the fulfillment of a dream I've had since I was nine years old. I have a distinct memory of the adventure book I was reading at the time, and of being awestruck when I looked at the world map I kept in my room, and realized how many oceans and time zones I'd need to cross to get here. I'm glad I finally made it.

I'm particularly grateful to my friend and colleague Dr. Mark Brophy, who was a Fulbright scholar at our organization in the U.S. in 2006, and who has been talking with many of you about Everyday Democracy, and doing such excellent work with ALA. And I am very grateful to Adult Learning Australia and to of West One Services for making it possible for me to be here.

I hope you won't be disappointed that I'm not going to talk just about "learning circles online." I'll get to that in a bit, but first I want to talk more directly about the reason that you all have come together. That is: Social inclusion, engaging the disengaged, and the important context of new communication technologies."
(Follow the link for the full speech)