News

From Our News Archive

Professor Tweel reflected on her experiences teaching civics to students in Freedom and Citizenship in an article published by Chalkbeat. Read the full article here. 

Shaun Abreu, member of the inaugural F&C class in 2009 and Columbia College graduate of 2014, is now a housing attorney at the New York Legal Assistance Group. He wrote this Op-Ed for the New York Daily News this winter reflecting on his experiences in housing justice. Check out the full article here.

In its Fall/Winter 2018 issue the Columbia Newsletter writes that Freedom & Citizenship "has raised the bar in developing our next generation of high school students to become 'informed, responsible citizens.'" The newsletter is published by Columbia's Office of Government and Community Affairs as a means of providing the university's neighbors with relevant news about the campus. The newsletter can be accessed as a pdf online

The Freedom & Citizenship Program was featured on Boston Public Radio in July 2018. Listen to or read the story here.

Symposium

Tuesday, April 10, 2:00pm

Butler Library, Room 522

The Heyman Center Public Humanities Initiative envisions ways for scholars to interact with and facilitate access to humanities scholarship for a larger public outside of academia. This year, the pilot program supported three scholars' projects focusing on the impact of scholarship on civic life and society. Freedom & Citizenship's Associate Director Jessica Lee will present along with Sahar Ullah, Leah Pires, Adam Blazej and Soo-Young Kim.

Dr. Lee's pilot program is a collaboration between the Center for American Studies and the Double Discovery Center. Its goal is to provide an introduction to the humanities and civic engagement to young New Yorkers. While Freedom & Citizenship works with high school seniors who have demonstrated a long-term commitment to academics and civics, the pilot program will target middle school students to instill interest in the humanities, college education, and civic engagement before they enter high school. Called "Socrates to Snapchat" the program has students examining challenging civic problems across time and space during four days of educational programming. Alumni of F&C will serve as teachers and teaching assistants. Any F&C alumni interested in working with Socrates to Snapchat should contact Dr. Lee directly. 

All are welcome to attend the symposium. Please RSVP here. 

Reading "Tell Me How it Ends" gives me a recollection of all the stories that were told to me as a kid, with the majority of my family being undocumented immigrants and having to come here to the United States by crossing the border. This book was a refresher about hearing the sad stories of people getting lost and a mixed emotion of hope, fear, and skepticism.

In an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Roosevelt Montás argues America's colleges have a responsibility to bolster America's liberal democracy by educating its students as citizens. Read his editorial to see why this matters so much and what is preventing colleges from taking up this cause.