MOUNT HOLYOKE COLLEGE CONFERENCE ON WISDOM
TO CONSIDER LIBERAL EDUCATION'S ROLE IN A CHANGING WORLD

Leaders of more than two dozen campuses to consider
how well their institutions equip students for active and responsible leadership

SOUTH HADLEY, Mass. -- How well are the nation's liberal arts colleges preparing students to become agents for positive change in a complex and troubled world? What should liberal arts colleges be doing to cultivate the social conscience, clear vision, and perspective essential for making wise choices? Mount Holyoke College will challenge the leaders of more than two dozen schools to consider these and other questions during "In Search of Wisdom: Liberal Education for a Changing World," a conference scheduled for April 4 through 6.

"Education for wise and ethical leadership captures broad and complex images of why liberal arts colleges exist, our mission, vision, and values," said Beverly Daniel Tatum, acting president of the College. "It presupposes that prestigious liberal arts colleges educate many of the nation's best and brightest. In this role, we must always strive to graduate individuals who possess integrity, embrace pluralism, are committed to social justice, and answer the call to responsible and active citizenship. Are we doing this? How well?"

Addressing these questions will be top educators from 26 liberal arts colleges. A partial list of institutions expected to participate includes Amherst, Antioch, Barnard, Bowdoin, Brown, Bryn Mawr, Connecticut, Macalester, Morehouse, Smith, Sarah Lawrence, Wellesley, and Williams colleges, as well as Colgate University, Duke University, Saint Lawrence University, the University of Michigan, the University of Puget Sound, the University of the South, and Wesleyan University. Each invited school has been asked to send a team of four people, including the president, senior administrators, and faculty leaders.

Underlying the conference is a concern about the decline in the norms, networks, and sense of community that allow people to work together for the common good. This phenomenon is reflected in many of our society's ills, such as school violence, religious intolerance, and crimes against women and children. The nation's campuses are not immune to these trends. Around the country, there is rising concern that too many students focus on narrow career goals without an accompanying concern for the common good, and too many seek success at any cost, as demonstrated in the rising tide of plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty.

The events of September 11 have only brought more urgency to the need to focus on education for a changing world, to make certain that students have the social conscience, clear vision, and perspective necessary for making wise and ethical decisions.

The conference will feature a mix of speakers, panel sessions, workshops, roundtable discussions, study circles, periods of reflection, a town meeting, and opportunities for multi-institutional planning. Seventeen visionary educators with diverse backgrounds have been invited to help frame the conversations. Among the participants are Johnetta Cole of Emory University, the former president of Spelman College; Elizabeth Kiss, founding director of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University; and Carol Geary Schneider, president of the American Association of Colleges and Universities.

Each campus has been asked to prepare a document that either outlines the programs and activities that contribute to students' development as responsible global citizens, or describes the campus' reaction to the terror attacks of September 11.

Two events will be open to the public:

• Keynote address
  Elizabeth Kiss, founding director of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University; April 4 at 7:30 PM in Gamble Auditorium of the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum.

• Listening to Communities: A Conversation Among Community Leaders
  Participants: The Rev. Dr. Otis Moss Jr., pastor of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church, and Judith Kurland of Women Waging Peace, a multiyear collaborative venture of Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government; April 5, 7 PM, Gamble Auditorium.