Drawing upon Swarthmore College’s reputation for innovation and tradition and its worldwide network to serve, support, and evolve the role of liberal arts education on the national and international stage, the College’s year-old Institute for the Liberal Arts (ILA) has two upcoming events designed to involve alumni and friends in its work.

On Oct. 24, in the talk “Now You See It: Why the Future of Higher Education Demands a Paradigm Shift,” Cathy Davidson, Ruth F. DeVarney Professor of English and John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Duke University, will explore how interactive digital technologies have transformed human learning processes. Davidson believes we are on the threshold of a monumental transformation in higher education, one aimed at the needs and expectations of the next generation of connected, multidisciplinary, and multicultural global learners.

On Feb. 22, the institute will celebrate the College’s sesquicentennial with a daylong symposium featuring alumni liberal arts leaders. Mary Schmidt Campbell ’69, P’90, dean of the NYU Tisch School of the Arts, will deliver the keynote address on the globalization of education. Panel discussions are titled Fostering a Democratic Society through Education and The Future of Knowledge and will feature: William Boulding ’77, dean of the Duke University Fuqua School of Business; Christopher Edley Jr. ’73, former dean of the UC–Berkeley School of Law; Christina Paxson ’82, president of Brown University; Phyllis Wang Wise ’67, chancellor at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign; Rebecca Bushnell ’74, professor and former dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania; Sean Decatur ’90, president of Kenyon College; Ellen Schall ’69, dean and professor of health policy and management at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service; and Philip Weiser ’90, dean of the University of Colorado Law School.

For more information, email institute@swarthmore.edu.