Grant Summary
$100,000 over 20 months. As part of the Phi Beta Kappa Society's effort to reinvigorate its chapters and associations, and specifically to empower these chapters to play a stronger role on their campuses as champions of liberal education, the Society will undertake a national initiative, coordinating projects on eleven campuses (Arizona State University, Carnegie-Mellon University, Colorado College, Drake University, Hendrix College, Hope College, Stetson University, The University of Texas, The University of Vermont, Wabash College, and Washington State University) focused on teaching deliberative approaches to things that matter. The goals of these campus projects are two: to examine the process of deliberation itself, and to explore a substantive "big question" (such as the essential nature of the human, the divine, the good life and the good human being, justice, beauty and sublimity). Responsibility for on-campus activities—seminars, discussions, forums, and other forms of instructional engagement—will be shared by the local Phi Beta Kappa chapter and a curricular authority on each campus. A concluding seminar in Washington D.C. will convene participants from all campuses involved, and the resulting White Paper will focus on the effectiveness of this process in developing a better understanding of major issues, as well as better ways of understanding what it is to hold a view well, and for good reasons.