Living the Hard Promise | Challenges to Higher Education: Faculty Perspectives on Our Shifting Landscape

Open expression is a hard promise: it is both a firm commitment and an extraordinarily difficult one. The mission of a great university requires that we question our assumptions and try to look through the eyes of others. Only through such dialogue can we begin to wrestle with the most challenging issues of our times.

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Join us for a timely discussion of the impacts of recent federal actions across higher education and here at Penn. Faculty panelists Daniel Hopkins, Douglas Jerolmack, and Tukufu Zuberi will join Interim Dean Jeffrey Kallberg to explore the shifting relationship between universities and the government, the consequences for research funding and academic freedom, and the broader political and cultural forces driving these changes. From challenges in STEM funding to the politicization of research and curricular autonomy, the discussion will highlight both immediate concerns and long-term implications. Together, we will consider what it means to uphold our values as a university and how faculty, staff, and students can respond to this evolving landscape.

Lunch will be provided. 

Faculty Panelists

Daniel Hopkins, Julie and Martin Franklin Presidential Professor of Political Science

Douglas Jerolmack, Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Term Professor of Earth and Environmental Science, School of Arts & Sciences, and Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, School of Engineering and Applied Science

Tukufu Zuberi, Lasry Family Professor of Race Relations and Professor of Sociology

Moderator

Jeffrey Kallberg, Interim Dean and William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Music History

The School of Arts and Sciences Living the Hard Promise series was launched in 2023 to engage all members of the campus community in the urgent task of fostering meaningful, empathetic dialogue around the challenging issues of our times.