Innovators join Campus in Convocations Line-up

Published: September 08, 2011 | Read Time: 1 minutes

Southern Utah University’s Convocations program has started its fall 2011 schedule, introducing a variety of ideas and guest speakers to students, faculty, staff and the Cedar City community all semester long.

The fall series opened on Sept. 1 with a visit from Senate Majority Leader and SUU Alumnus Harry Reid. As the semester continues, speakers will address topics including politics, music, creativity, health care systems and leadership. Visiting lecturers will come from all over North America and will include such well-known names as Ken Jennings, all-time Jeopardy! Champion, and Firoozeh Dumas, acclaimed author of Funny in Farsi — A Memoir of Growing up Iranian in America.

SUU’s Distinguished Fellow of Creative Engagement Raymond Grant is excited about this fall’s schedule and encourages everyone to come.

“The purpose of Convocations is to bring to the campus gifted leaders, thinkers and innovators to have a wonderful dialogue with students, faculty, staff and the community at large,” Grant says.

This idea actually has developed into the new Convocations theme: “Leaders, Thinkers, and Innovators,” which Grant says better describes the program.

“I believe it better draws our ability to highlight academic achievement and increase the profile of that achievement on the SUU campus,” he says.

He adds that Convocations are a great way to expose students to new ideas and to start discussions. Grant says whether or not the audience agrees with the speaker, is irrelevant to the value of this lecture series; all that matters is that a dialog might be started to discuss and weigh new ideas.

Generally, the Convocations series is held Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m. in the SUU Auditorium, unless otherwise noted.

Additional information about this fall’s Convocations line-up is available online at suu.edu/convocations.

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