Summit Panel
Fifty-seven educators and policy makers from forty-one campuses, ranging from Yale to UCLA, from Florida to Wisconsin, gathered in Philadelphia November 5-6 for the annual Miller Higher Education ‘summit.’ Judge Marjorie Rendell, First Lady of Pennsylvania, addressed the participants at lunch, welcoming them to the Keystone state and outlining efforts with which she is engaged, such as PennCord (the Pennsylvania Coalition for Representative Democracy, http://www.penncord.org/).
During the Miller conference college presidents, deans, professors, and policy makers joined in intensive efforts to learn from one another’s experiences, as well as clarify foundational issues such as the relationship between liberal education and civic education. The discussions and breakout sessions focused on how programs such as the Jack Miller Center, donors, professors, and other educators can work together to strengthen college and university programs that deepen students’ knowledge and understanding of American history and institutions. Participants reported on the remarkable progress made in the past year in establishing certificate programs on a number of campuses, and identified opportunities to collaborate on additional efforts in the coming year.
As they left Philadelphia participants said: “ It means a great deal to … be a part of such an intellectually exciting and encouraging community.” And, “thank you again for the wonderful, intense conference that you organized. It succeeded tremendously in the dual goals of making connections and developing (and sharing) ideas for our programs. It is a delight to work with you …”
Rear Admiral Mike Ratliff highlighted the innovative “President’s Forum” on November 6, that brought together four college presidents to update a “conversation about university
Judge Marjorie Rendell
education and citizenship initiated by the founding generation as they returned home following the American revolution.” This forum emerged from discussions with Lee Fritschler, now a professor at George Mason University, but longtime president of Dickinson College, who hosted a 1998 conference to consider what America’s founders intended as they transformed nine of the existing colonial colleges and established fifteen new colleges to ‘prepare Americans for their new duties as citizens of the new nation.’ As the introduction to that earlier gathering at Dickinson College noted:
“Old or new, all of the American Revolutionary Colleges participated in a dramatic rethinking of relationships between education and citizenship inspired by the political and ideological debates of the period.”
The Jack Miller Center looks forward to the seventh Miller Conference on higher education in 2010, which will continue to provide an occasion for dedicated educators to find ways we can work together to strengthen higher civic education.
Jack Miller
Tags: civic education, Civics Education, Colleges and Universities, Jack Miller Center, liberal education