Accepting his 2008 TED Prize, author Dave Eggers asks the TED community to engage with their local school. With spellbinding eagerness, he talks about how his 826 Valencia tutoring center inspired others around the world to open their own volunteer-driven, wildly creative writing labs. But you don’t need to go that far, he reminds us — it’s as simple as asking a teacher “How can I help?” Share your own volunteering stories at his new website, Once Upon a School. To brainstorm on this wish and get involved, join the conversation >> (Recorded February 2008 in Monterey, California. Duration: 24:29.)

Watch Dave Eggers’s TED Prize talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances.