News and Events

Cortland Mayoral Debate on Wednesday, October 28 at 5:45  in Brown Auditorium.

The mayoral candidates, Erich A. Demunn, Dorothy Dumond, and Susan D. Feiszli, will be debating issues that affect the city of Cortland from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. Please be sure to arrive by 5:45 at Brown Auditorium.

SUNY Trustee and Cortland Alum to Speak at Leadership Conference

Stephen J. Hunt will give the key note address on November 12^th as part of SUNY Cortland's "Fire It Up: Lead the Way to Change" Leadership Conference. This conference is the kick-off event in SUNY Cortland's Building Community Leaders project for which SUNY Cortland received a $247,000 grant with the help of Congressional Representative Michael Arcuri.  The Conference is the first part of an initiative that provides Cortland students an opportunity to develop their leadership skills. The conference is open to students, community members and faculty/staff.

Stephen J. Hunt, the keynote speaker, was appointed by Governor George Pataki in 1996 to chair the College Council of the State University of New York College at Cortland, his Alma Mater. As Chairman, Mr. Hunt was instrumental in the construction of the SUNY Cortland Stadium Complex, the first major facility to be constructed at SUNY Cortland since 1973. In 2003, Mr. Hunt led a nationwide search which resulted in the selection of Cortland's current president.  Mr. Hunt also served on the search committee for the SUNY Chancellor.  Mr. Hunt will draw from his 35 years of experience in the public and private sector to discuss the importance of leadership development in today's rapidly changing global community.

In addition to Mr. Hunt's address, the program features a morning plenary session and a number of workshops. Plenary speakers Tom Gallagher, current Mayor of Cortland and Tom Young, former Mayor of Syracuse will present  "Make an Impact in Public Service: A Community Career Panel."  Participants will gain insight from leaders who are involved in the community at the local level.  They will explain why community service is important and share strategies for getting into the field of community service, offer insights about their own professional paths, and provide tips on developing your own leadership skills.

Workshops include the following sessions from which participants may choose:

• Mariana Lebron of Syracuse University will present "The Power of You: Social Change in Action."  In this workshop, participants will be introduced to the Social Change Model of Leadership Development, while also being challenged to be true to who you are in an encouraging, supportive environment. In the end, the power of you is the power to transform. Are you willing to take a stand?
• Dean Joel McCarthy of Wells College will present "Anatomy of an Effective Leader" which will provide an overview of the many qualities society admires in a good leader - innovator, educator, organizer, motivator, and ethical, to name a few.  When examining your own personal strengths and challenges, do you have what is needed to be an effective leader?
• SUNY Cortland students from the Political Science and Education Clubs will present "Skills for Active Student Leadership."  The students will provide stories which highlight the necessary skills they have learned for leadership development and overcoming obstacles.

• Mac M. Knight, Principal Cortland Junior-Senior High School will present "Understanding Global Leadership: Building Bridges across the Multi-Cultural Divide."  Leadership success is unattainable without intercultural competence and cross-cultural adaptability. This workshop provides participants with the tools to develop leadership skills that allow them to function more effectively in our culturally diverse society by building bridges of understanding. 

This event is sponsored by SUNY Cortland's Institute for Civic Engagement, the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education, Leadership Cortland, SUNY Cortland AmeriCorps, The Corporation for National and Community Service, and the Cortland County Youth Bureau. The conference takes place on Thursday, November 12^th , in Corey Union  on the SUNY Cortland campus from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.  Attendance for the conference is free but registration is required.  The full schedule, online registration form and a complete list of presenters is available on Cortland's Institute for Civic Engagement website at:

http://www2.cortland.edu/programs/civicengagement/Fall_2009_Leadership_Conference/

For more information, contact the conference coordinator, Dr. Christopher Latimer at Christopher.latimer@cortland.edu or by phone (607) 753-4802.

Movie Series: Untold Stories

Each year the State University of New York (SUNY) College at Cortland chooses an academic theme that shapes the various educational programs on campus throughout the year. In previous years the themes have focused on the environment and issues of fundamentalism. This year the academic theme is “Walls.” Main Street Community Outreach Coordinator, Timothy Rodriguez, has organized a movie series entitled Untold Stories relating to this theme.

SUNY Cortland’s Cultural and Intellectual Climate Committee, chaired by Kevin Sheets, Associate Professor of History, explains that the “Walls” concept includes all types of “walls, fences, borders, limits, boundaries, [and] barriers.” Rodriguez says that Untold Stories “will show perspectives of societal and world events that aren’t often articulated in the dominant mainstream culture of the United States. Relating to the academic theme, this series can be used to break down some of the ideological walls that exist today.”

The month of October will present three films that focus on examining the media in our society, beginning on October 8 with Manufacturing Consent, a documentary based on MIT Professor and Linguist, Noam Chomsky’s work. On October 15, the documentary Outfoxed, which focuses on the Chief Executive Officer of News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch, and Fox News, will be shown. The month of October will conclude on Thursday the 22nd with the documentary Orwell Roles in His Grave, which features information from media specialists, with the title referring to George Orwell’s “newspeak.”

The month of November will present three films focusing on the effects of United States intervention abroad. On November 4, a documentary entitled The War on Democracy will focus on U.S. intervention in Venezuela, Guatemala, Chile, and Bolivia. Peace, Propaganda, and the Promised Land, a documentary on the Israel-Palestine conflict and the U.S. media that reports it, will be shown on November 12. Lastly, the movie series, Untold Stories, will conclude on November 19 with the film Breaking Ranks, which features testimony from Iraq War Veterans who have deserted the military to oppose the current wars.

Untold Stories, a movie series on media and U.S. interventions, sponsored by SUNY Cortland’s Institute for Civic Engagement, will take place on the dates stated above in SUNY Cortland’s Brown Auditorium of Old Main at 7 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. For more information contact Timothy Rodriguez at (607) 753-22nd.

Sandwich Seminar:

"Is It the End of the Univeristy as We Know It: Do We Feel Fine?" 

The Institute for Civic Engagement will present a panel discussion, "Is It the End of the University as We Know It: Do We Feel Fine?" on October 8, 2009, at noon in Jacobs Lounge, Brockway Hall, on the SUNY Cortland Campus.  The featured presenters are Dr. Brian D. Barrett, Assistant Professor, in the Foundations and Social Advocacy Department of the School of Education, and Mr. Anthony J. Nocella, Lecturer in Sociology/Anthropology and Ph.D. candidate at Syracuse University. Dr. Jerry O'Callaghan, Associate Professor of Political Science and Associate Dean of Arts and Sciences, will be the moderator for the panel and the discussion.

The panelists will be responding to an op-ed editorial that appeared in the New York Times on April 26, 2009. The editorial, by Mark C. Taylor, chair of the religion department at Columbia University, was entitled, "End the University As We Know It," and it can be found on the Internet at  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/opinion/27taylor.html.

 According to Dr. Richard Kendrick, Director of the Institute for Civic Engagement, "Dr. Taylor's controversial critique of universities of higher education has sparked a great deal of discussion about the organization and role of colleges in the 21^st century." To date, 437 responses to the article have been posted on the New York Times Web site.  "Dr. Taylor expresses the view that colleges need to integrate their programs to create more interdisciplinary collaborations, do away with traditional departments, increase their ties to one another to avoid duplication of programs, and abolish tenure," said Dr. Kendrick. "These are provocative ideas that have generated a lot of debate.  I think it's important to have an opportunity to think about them and respond to them, so I expect the discussion to be lively."

The panelists, Dr. Brian D. Barrett and Mr. Anthony Nocella are well qualified to respond to this editorial. Dr. Barrett is an assistant professor in the Foundations and Social Advocacy Department of the School of Education at SUNY Cortland and also serves as the graduate follow-up coordinator with the State University of New York College at Cortland's Urban Recruitment of Educators (C.U.R.E.) program. He is a past member of the board of directors of the Sociology of Education Association and his work has recently been published in journals including Teaching and Teacher Education, the British Journal of Sociology of Education, Religion and Education, and Educational Studies. Prior to arriving at Cortland he received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge and served as a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Notre Dame's Center for Research on Educational Opportunity. Mr. Nocella is a Lecturer in Sociology in the Sociology/Anthropology Department of the School of Arts and Sciences at SUNY Cortland. He is a Ph.D. candidate in Social Science at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He holds Master's degrees in Peacemaking and Conflict Studies (Fresno Pacific University) and in Cultural Foundations of Education (Syracuse University). He has published more than 25 articles in a variety of journals. Most recently, he was the co-editor of a volume devoted to issues in higher education, Academic Repression: Reflections from the Academic Industrial Complex.

This event is free and open to the public.