Lecture Archive
Speakers and Topics
September 12: Paul Kelleher (Medical History and Bioethics, Philosophy). “Ethics and Health: Resource Allocation during COVID-19”
September 19: Adam Nelson (Education Policy Studies, History). “From the Land Grant to the Wisconsin Idea 1862-1912”
September 26: Monica Macaulay (Language Studies). “The Indigenous Languages of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Idea”
October 3: Daniel Hummel (UW–Madison History PhD 2016, Upper House). “UW, the Wisconsin Idea, and Religion: A Historical View”
October 10: Kacie Lucchini Butcher (Public History Project Director, History). “Reckoning with our Past: Public History and the Wisconsin Idea”
October 17: Lori Lopez (Communication Arts, Asian-American Studies). “Studying Asian-Americans and Media in Wisconsin”
October 24: Cory Mason (BA 2000, Mayor of Racine, WI). “What the Wisconsin Idea Could or Should Mean”
October 31: Diana Hess (Dean of the UW–Madison School of Education). “Why We Created the Discussion Project”
November 7: Lesley Sager (Design Studies, Founder of Merry-Go-Strong). “When Everyone Designs”
November 14: Courtney Bell (Director of the Wisconsin Center for Educational Research). “Enacting the Wisconsin Idea in Education Research and Practice: Opportunities and Dilemmas Amidst Inequities”
November 28: Greg Nemet (La Follette School of Public Affairs). “The Climate Problem Is Getting Worse but the Solutions Are Getting Better”
December 5: Christy Clark-Pujara (Afro-American Studies and History). “Black on the Midwestern Frontier 1725-1866”
December 12: Mariana Castro (Research Director, Multilingual Learning Research Center). “Multilingualism in Wisconsin: Leveraging Linguistic Diversity in Education through the Wisconsin Idea”
Speakers and Topics:
Introduction to The Wisconsin Idea
Sept. 8: Chad Alan Goldberg (Department of Sociology, UW–Madison), “The University’s Service to Democracy”
The Wisconsin Idea and Public Health
Sept 15: Tessa Conroy (Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, UW–Madison), “What Does the 1918 Flu Pandemic Teach Us about the Economic Impacts of COVID-19? The Likeness to and Differences from a Century Ago”
Sept 22: Sarah Marshall (Waisman Center, UW–Madison), “Improving Communication Access in Healthcare during COVID-19 and Beyond”
Sept 29: William Hartman (School of Medicine and Public Health, UW–Madison), “Staying Cool in the Middle of a Fire: Hope and Trust the Community”
Oct 6: Norman Fost (School of Medicine and Public Health, UW–Madison), “Rationing Ventilators during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Benefits and Limits of Bioethics”
Oct 13: Dominique Brossard (Department of Life Sciences Communication, UW–Madison), “Communicating about COVID-19: The Wisconsin Idea in Action”
Oct 20: Aaron Fai (Center for the Humanities, UW–Madison), “‘Humanities Responders’ to COVID-19”
The Wisconsin Idea and the Economy
Oct 27: Neil Kraus (Department of Politics, Geography and International Studies, UW–River Falls), “Reality or Fantasy? The Economy, Inequality, and Education Reform”
Nov 3: Steven C. Deller (Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, UW–Madison), “Extension and the Wisconsin Idea”
The Wisconsin Idea, Expertise, and Public Policy
Nov 10: Fred Clark (Wisconsin’s Green Fire), “Conservation in Practice: Science, Policy, and the Wisconsin Idea”
Nov 17: Jennifer Gaddis (School of Human Ecology, UW–Madison), “The Past and Future of School Lunch as a Form of Public Care”
Revisiting Charles McCarthy’s Wisconsin Idea
Nov 24: Jeff Snowbarger and Ross Tangedal (Department of English, UW–Stevens Point), “Charles McCarthy’s The Wisconsin Idea: Past, Present, and Future”
Inclusion and the Wisconsin Idea
Dec 1: Torsheika Maddox (Office of Strategic Diversity Planning and Research, UW–Madison), “DEI @ UW–Madison: Past, Present, and Future”
The Making of the Wisconsin Idea
Dec 8: Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen (Department of History, UW–Madison), “The Ideas That Made the Wisconsin Idea”
Speakers and Topics
Introduction to the Wisconsin Idea:
September 10: J. David Hoeveler, “The Wisconsin Idea: At the Political Crossroads”
The Wisconsin Idea and Education of the Citizenry:
September 17: Harry Brighouse, “Strengthening Education Outcomes”
September 24: Dean Diana Hess, “Higher Education as Preparation for Political and Civic Engagement”
Enacting the Public Mission
October 1: Jake Vander Zanden, “Limnology and the Wisconsin Idea”
October 8: Douglas Maynard, “Why and How Understanding the Diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder Embodies the Wisconsin Idea”
October 15: Steven Ventura, Monica White, and Greg Lawless, “Engagement with Food and Agricultural Systems”
Inclusion and the Wisconsin Idea
October 22: Benny Witkovsky, “The Local Periphery: Small Cities and the Politics of Exclusion”
October 29: Gloria Ladson-Billings, “Educating all of Wisconsin’s Students?”
Democracy and Engagement with the Citizenry:
November 5: Katherine Cramer, “The Local Voices Network: Community-Driven Listening to Strengthen Democracy”
November 12: Dietram Scheufele, “From CRISPR to AI: What Happens When Sifting and Winnowing has to Involve More than Science?”
November 19: Movie “Outsourced: The New Wisconsin Idea”
November 26: Evan Polman, “Power and Nudging: A Behavioral Science Approach to Helping People”
Democracy, Inclusion and the Wisconsin Idea Revisited:
December 3: Erin Barbato, “Immigrants in Contemporary Society and the Wisconsin Idea”
December 10: Ada Deer and Larry Nesper, “Native American Experiences and the Wisconsin Idea”
List of Speakers and Topics:
Sept. 11
Gwen Drury, Wisconsin Idea Historian
A Tribute to University Extension
Sept. 18
Cheese folks: Mike Gingrich of Uplands Dairy & John Jaeggi of Center for Dairy Research
Forward! The Reinvention of the Wisconsin Dairy
Sept. 25
Alfonso Morales, Ph.D., Urban and Regional Planning, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Advancing the IDEA: Whose Perspective and the Implications for How?
Oct. 2
Michael W. Wagner, Ph.D., School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Communicating the Wisconsin Idea in a Polarized Era
Oct. 9
Karen Bogenschneider, Ph.D., Human Development & Family Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Universities as Honest Knowledge Brokers: The Case Study of the Family Impact Seminars
Oct. 16
Hilary Shager, Institute for Research on Poverty, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Reducing Poverty via Researcher, Practitioner, and Community Partnerships
Oct. 23
Daniel Grabois, Ph.D., Horn at the Mead
Music Outreach, Music Inreach
Oct. 30
Gavin Luter, Ph.D., Director of the UniverCity Alliance, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Making the Wisconsin Idea Local: The UniverCity Alliance’s Work with Local Government?
Nov. 6
Jane Collins, Ph.D., Community & Environmental Sociology and Gender & Women’s Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Preserving the “Public Household”: The Wisconsin Idea and the 2011 Protests
Nov. 13
Bill Tracy, Ph.D., Agronomy, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Nov. 20
Tom Broman, Ph.D., History Department, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Wisconsin 101: A Crowd-Sources Public Humanities
Nov. 27
Barry Burden, Ph.D., Director, Elections Research Center College of Letters and Science, University of Wisconsin–Madison
What Just Happened? An Academic Analysis of the 2018 Elections
Dec. 4
Jon Shelton, Ph.D., University of Green Bay
The Wisconsin Idea in the New Gilded Age
Dec. 11
David J. Weerts, Ph.D., Alumnus, Department of Educational Policy & Administration, University of Minnesota
From the Good Society to the Productive Society: Changing Conceptions of the Wisconsin
List of Speakers and Topics:
(click here for one page PDF printable version) 496 Schedule 2017 short
September 12th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Gwen Drury – “The Wisconsin Idea: How do we Define the Concept that Defines Us?”
September 19th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Kevin Walters – “Think Local, Act Global: The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and the Soil of the Wisconsin Idea”
September 26th, 7pm, Town Center, Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, 330 N. Orchard St.
Pam Herd – “The Wisconsin Longitudinal Study: What Tracking the Lives of the Wisconsin High School Class of 1957 has Taught us about Leading Happy and Healthy Lives”
October 3rd, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Caitlin Cieslik-Miskimen – “Journalism and the Wisconsin Idea”
October 10th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Maryo Gard-Ewell – “No Mute Inglorious Milton: The Arts & the Wisconsin Idea”
October 17th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Adam Nelson – “Land Grand Universities and the Wisconsin Idea, 1862-1912”
October 24th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Emily Auerbach – “The Power to Change Lives: The UW Odyssey Project”
October 31st, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Bill Casper – “Sturgeon”
November 7th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Nigel Cook – “Giving Cows the Spa Treatment: How do we Balance Animal Welfare with Economic Realities on the Dairy”
November 14th, 7pm, Town Center, Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, 330 N. Orchard
Meg Gaines – “The Center for Patient Partnerships: Wandering the Back Roads for the Wisconsin Idea”
November 21st, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Myra Marx Ferree – “Wisconsin Women’s Studies: A History of Progressive Innovation”
November 28th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Paul Williams – “Agriculture and the Wisconsin Idea”
December 5th, 7pm, Town Center, Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery, 330 N. Orchard
Paula Niedenthal – “The Path from Basic to Applied Research, Or: What the Hell are you Doing with My Tax Dollars?”
December 11th, 7pm, 1111 Genetics/Biotechnology Center, 425 Henry Mall
Garry Golden – “Back to the Future?”