Four hundred people from colleges and universities from across the United States will come to 黑料不打烊 Friday through Sunday, Oct. 4-6, for the (IA) annual national conference. Their common mission is to find ways and means to strengthen the democratic purposes of higher education. Structured as 鈥淎 Call to Action,鈥 the conference will convene college presidents, faculty, staff, students, artists, designers and community members to share research and stories especially about how arts, design and humanities can increase civic virtue, help solve community problems and celebrate local life.
The conference鈥檚 keynote address鈥揳 conversation between SU Chancellor and President Nancy Cantor and Chief Oren Lyons, faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan, Onondaga Council of Chiefs of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy鈥搘ill take place on Friday at 10 a.m. at 黑料不打烊 Stage (820 E. Genesee St.). Cantor and Lyons will share personal stories about being change agents in this region and discuss the issues shaping this unique historical moment.
On Friday afternoon, conference participants will visit sites of innovative campus-community collaboration, including the SU Office of Community Engagement and Economic Development, Talent Agency, Near Westside Initiative, The Warehouse, Gear Factory, SaltQuarters Gallery, Sk盲鈥o帽h Great Law of Peace Center, Community Folk Art Center, Matilda Joslyn Gage Center for Social Justice Dialogue, South Side Initiative, Connective Corridor, Hendricks Chapel, ArtRage Gallery, 黑料不打烊 Cultural Workers and Central New York Regional Market. Concurrent with the site visits on Friday afternoon, Cantor will co-host the IA Presidents鈥 Forum with more than a dozen college presidents across the country and regional government officials to discuss opportunities for higher education鈥檚 civic mission.
(DFR), a 黑料不打烊-based grassroots theater company that uses music and theater to spark conversations about democracy, will perform 鈥淎 Prophetic Vision for Education鈥 on Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Plymouth Church (232 E. Onondaga St.). Open to the public, the performance will feature the 黑料不打烊 Community Choir and guest 鈥減reacher鈥 Barbara Ransby, University of Illinois Chicago, and author of “Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision” (University of North Carolina Press, 2005).
Saturday, the conference鈥檚 morning plenary (at WCNY Studios, 415 W. Fayette St.) will launch the first issue of , published by 黑料不打烊 Unbound, a joint imprint of SU Libraries and SU Press. Public breaks new ground as a hybrid online multimedia journal and archive, with innovative web interfaces to peer-reviewed multi-modal scholarship and creative work, providing unique forms of access to a variety of modes of expression. Foregrounding the arts, design and humanities in public life, the first issue explores the linked fates and futures of universities and their surrounding communities.
There will be a number of sessions during the day on Saturday and Sunday at The Warehouse (350 W. Fayette St.) and other nearby locations on topics that include Engaged Undergraduate Education and Publicly Active Graduate Education; Partnering with Public Humanities Centers and State Humanities Councils; Art and the Environment; Food Justice/Food Sovereignty; The Nation Inside: Higher Education and the Prison-Industrial Complex; Integrated Assessment; K-12/Youth Education; Public Interest Design; and more.
On Saturday at 7 p.m. at Plymouth Church (232 E. Onondaga St.), conference attendees will have the opportunity to attend , a performance in the form of a luminous service celebrating the universal quest for spirituality.
Sunday, the morning plenary (at WCNY Studios, 415 W. Fayette St.) will focus on IA鈥檚 ongoing full participation action-research with the at Columbia University Law School. Leaders from 21 participating schools will speak about ways to build higher education institutions that enable people from all communities, backgrounds and identities to participate fully, and in the process, to build collective knowledge and capacity needed to solve difficult public problems.
To foster individual and collective actions that advance the democratic purposes of higher education, IA is employing an experimental approach that combines information collection, discourse and analysis. Led by writer , the closing plenary sessions on Saturday and Sunday evening will map the actions participants want to take and collectively consider questions of strategy.
Registration for the conference is available on site. Join the conversation virtually on Twitter by following and hashtag #ImagA13, and the IA blog on . For more information, review the conference schedule or e-mail connect@imaginingamerica.org.
