The Higher Education Exchange is an annual journal from the Kettering Foundation that serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share. The 2005 edition focuses on “public scholarship.”  Below is an excerpt from the introduction… think part of the answer to the question of why scholars write for us is contained in the essays in this volume. Every one of the scholars […] (continue)

The Higher Education Exchange is an annual journal from the Kettering Foundation that serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share. The 2004 edition celebrates the tenth anniversary of the journal. Below is an excerpt from the introduction… We’re celebrating! This issue of the Higher Education Exchange marks the tenth anniversary of the journal. I vividly remember when I turned ten; the magic of […] (continue)

The Higher Education Exchange is an annual journal from the Kettering Foundation that serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share. The 2003 edition asks “what is higher education’s obligation to democracy?”  Below is an excerpt from the introduction… What is higher education’s obligation to democracy? For some time, this has been a driving question behind Kettering’s work in higher education. Through this […] (continue)

The Higher Education Exchange is an annual journal from the Kettering Foundation that serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share. The 2002 edition revisits “the conversation about public scholarship.”  Below is an excerpt from the introduction… While public scholarship, and issues of definition and implementation, are understood by our readers as the focus of this journal, there are additional themes that […] (continue)

The Higher Education Exchange is an annual journal from the Kettering Foundation that serves as a forum for new ideas and dialogue between scholars and the larger public. Essays explore ways that students, administrators, and faculty can initiate and sustain an ongoing conversation about the public life they share. The 2001 edition examines “higher education and engagement of public issues .”  Below is an excerpt from the introduction… As coeditor of this journal, I receive mail from many organizations and individuals who are part of the higher education field. I […] (continue)

The National Issues Forums Institute provides many resources for teachers.  Along with an entire section of their website dedicated to educators (including classroom material, issue guides and course descriptions), NIF has created an online forum space where educators can share experiences using NIF material. Are you looking for new ways to engage students in productive, deliberative conversations in your classroom? Are you interested in connecting with other teachers who are thinking about ways to instruct a new generation of citizens? Have you used National Issues […] (continue)

This is a video of a presentation summarizing the work of and the theory behind the Colorado State University Center for Public Deliberation. It makes the case for changing the way we talk to each other about difficult issues, and summarizes the key aspects of the deliberative democracy movement. Recorded at the Poudre River Public Library District as part of a presentation of a series of democratic conversations, this “kick-off talk” was given by Martin Carcasson, a CSU Communications Professor and Director of the Center […] (continue)

On October 12, 2012, the newly launched Difficult Dialogues National Resource Center (DDNRC) issued the National Difficult Dialogues Movement Declaration. The mission of the Difficult Dialogues National Resource Center (DDNRC) is to advance innovative practices in higher education that promote respectful, transformative dialogue on controversial topics and complex social issues, thereby reflecting a commitment to pluralism and academic freedom and strengthening a democratically engaged society. (continue)

The American Democracy Project’s Global Engagement Scholars have produced the 2nd edition of their Educating Globally Competent Citizens: A Toolkit. Edited by Steven Elliott-Gower (Georgia College), Dennis Falk (University of Minnesota Duluth) and Martin Shapiro (California State University, Fresno), this toolkit is a guide for faculty and staff who want to educate globally competent citizens using CSIS’s 7 Revolutions Framework. The toolkit is a companion guide to AASCU’s Global Challenges: Promise and Peril in the 21st Century national blended-learning course. (continue)

The term “Civil Dialogue,” as used by colleagues at Arizona State University, refers to a structured format for public dialogue. On their website, at www.civil-dialogue.com, they describe their work as “Using structured, public dialogue to build a bridge across the chasm of polarized viewpoints on hot topics, and to restore civility in public discourse.” The format was created at the Hugh Downs School of Human Communication at Arizona State University and continues to be developed by John Genette, Jennifer Linde, Clark Olson, and other scholars. (continue)