2025 Conference on Civic Thought, Education, and Leadership

"Rhetoric and Reform in American Thought", with panelists Derek Foret (University of Texas at Austin), “Recognizing Rhetoric as a Liberal and Logical Art”; James C. Howard (Baylor University), “’Any Man Can Make Out the Constitution to be Anti-Slavery’: William Lloyd Garrison’s Policial Shift and the Duty of Compromise”; and Paul Siewers (Bucknell University), “Raising the Jolly Roger: ‘Open Discourse’ efforts at Bucknell University

"Educating for Citizenship and Civility", with panelists Katerine Helmick (University of Oxford), “Russell Kirk on Education”; Greg McBrayer (Ashland University), “Leading Students to Citizenship in an Illiberal Moment”; and David McPherson (Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education “Civility and Civil Discourse”

"Liberal Education and Civic Renewal", with panelists Matthew Hazelton (University of Toledo), “Antoinette Main Mason”; Richard Reinsch (Civitas Institute at University of Texas at Austin), “Pierre Manent’s Freedom and Communion and Its Meaning for American Politics”; and Benjamin Slomski (Purdue University), “Civic Education, Political Science, and Liberal Education

"Classical Roots of Civic Life", with panelists Evelyn Behling (University of Notre Dame), “Aristotle, Populism, and Defining the Political Need for Expertise”; Elizabeth L’Arrivee (Rosary College), “Autonomy or Subordination? Dewey, the Founders, and the Classical Roots of Civic Education”; and Brennan McDavid (Chapman University), “Peer Disagreement in Aristotle”

“Cherokee Nation Citizenship”, featuring speaker Aaron Kushner (Arizona State University)

“The Current State of the Civic-Thought Movement”, featuring speaker Jenna Storey (American Enterprise Institute)

"Virtue and Civic Vision", with panelists Spencer Case (University of Arizona), “Patriotism as a Virtue”; and David Smith (Wilfred Laurier University), “Corruption and the Civic Imagination”

"Cicero and Civic Duty", with panelists Theodore Madrid (Hillsdale College), “Detachment or Duty: Lucretius and Cicero on Civic Duty in Times of Turmoil”; and David T. West (Ashbrook Center), “Cicero as Civic Educator: Arguments for Political Engagement in a Republic Crisis”

“Civic Education and Youth Political Engagement in Rural America”, with panelists Joseph Keegin (Tulane University), “The St. Louis Hegelians and Philosophy as Civic Education”; Aaron Kunin (Pomona College), “Ellison’s Culture of a Whole”; and Marylena Mantas-Kourounis (Sacred Heart University)

"Liberal Education and Civic Formation in Historical Perspective", with panelists Nicholas Barden (Georgetown University), “Liberal Education and Juristic Formation: Lessons from Petrarch, Valla, and Hotman”; Carola Binder (University of Texas at Austin), “Historians of the Future: Ludwig Von Mises on Civic Education”; and Jonathan Green (New York University), “Moses Mendelssohn on Luxury, Leadership, and the Moral Fragility of Prosperous Societies”

"Citizenship Before Partnership", keynote address featuring Justin Dyer (University of Texas)

"Memory, Meaning, and Citizenship", with panelists Daniel Burns (University of Dallas), “The Place of Academic Theology Within Civic Thought” ; Benjamin Haines (Emory University), “What is History’s Role in Civic Education?” ; and Isaac Tuttle (Baylor University), “Humility in the Face of History”

"Founding Virtues and Vision", with panelists Joseph Postell (Hillsdale College), “’The Least Fallible Guide’: Reason, Theory, and Experience in The Federalist” ; Hayden Proborowski (Indiana University), “This Colossus of Despotism: Tyranny, Moral Character, and the Presidency During the American Founding” ; Jeanette Richard (Hillsdale College), “Noah Webster and the Proper Grounds of Patriotism in the American Republic”

"Adaptation and Alchemy: Crisis Responses", with panelists Nathanael Mickelson (University of Georgia), “The Rebirth of Alchemy: Southern Democrats and the Gold Reserve Act of 1934” ; and Jacob Bruggeman (Johns Hopkins University), “The Republic of Technology, Revisited: How the History of Technology Relates to Civics in Modern America”

"Soul, Society, and Civic Struggle", with Jack Bevacqua (University of Notre Dame), “The Self-Enclosure of the Democratic Soul: Tocqueville on an Education in the Infinite"; and ” Philip Pinell (Florida State University), “Civic Thought and the Problem of Political Disaffection”

“The Poetry of American Citizenship”, featuring Mark Bauerlein (Emory University)

“Changing Value Dimensions in Higher Education? Evidence from Faculty Job Postings in Education, Business, and the Social Sciences”, featuring Sean Patrick Kelly (University of Pittsburg), “Changing Value Dimensions in Higher Education? Evidence from Faculty Job Postings in Education, Business, and the Social Sciences”

"Literary Foundations of Civic Life", with panelists Nathalie Dugginapeddi (University of Chicago), “The Altruistic Grand Inquisitor: On Free Will and Miracles in Brothers Karamazov” ; Dutton Kearney (Hillsdale College), “The Elements of Analysis: How to Read, Think, and Write About Literature” ; Bond West (Canterbury Institute), “Saga Literature and Civic Virtue”

"Race, Reason, and Republic", with panelists Joey Barretta (Washington & Lee University), “The Importance of African American Political Thought for the Civic Education Movement” ; Deni Kasa (Oxford University), “Milton & Civic Education” ; Jason Stevens (Ashland University), “Abraham Lincoln, Stephen Douglas, and the ‘Galesburg Challenge’”

"Civic Leadership & Engagement in American Education", with panelists Evan Dutmer (Culver Academies), “A Mirror for Fellow Citizens: A Ciceronian Model of Civic Leadership” ; Boleslaw Z. Kabala (Tarleton State University), “Incentivizing Civic Engagement at Public and Private Universities: Tax Exemptions, Laws, and Critical Dialogues—Responding to Our Critics” ; and Casey Spinks (University of Texas at Austin), “The Question of Nature in American Civics”

"Leadership, Law, & Civic Trust in Crisis", with panelists Andrew Goodheart (University of Nebraska), “Breaking Faith? The State of Military-Civic Society Relations in an Age of Endless War” ; Dimitrios Halikias (Princeton University), “The Progressive Critique of Leaderless Government and the Rule of Law” ; and Cameron Kim (Duke University) & Nika Iliva (Duke University), “Engineer of 2025? Leadership Without Foundation: Gaps in Education, Consensus, and Character Formation”

"Civic Challenges Across Communities", with panelists Veronica Bryant (American Council of Trustees and Alumni) and Rebecca Richards (University of Kent), “The Educated Citizen: Donors, Democracy, and the Liberal Arts” ; Jason Lantzer (Butler University), “Civic Need, Civic Virtue: The Debate Over Economic Development and Immigration in one Indiana Community” ; Nicole Penn (George Mason University), “’Everything Which Makes the Game of Life Worth Living’: American Women and the Challenge of Modernity at the Turn of the Twentieth Century”; and Sean Rhodes (Ashbrook Center), “Faith Beyond Roads: Religious Liberty, Public Safety, and What Amish Communities Reveal About American Faith and Politics”