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In his Jan. 25 talk “Leading Nowhere: the Futility and Farce of Global Climate Negotiations,” Oren Cass criticized the global approach to addressing climate change. He claimed that it’s not that leaders don’t want to reduce emissions, it’s that it isn’t possible based on insurmountable challenges like cost and complexity. 

The Hamilton Association for Volunteering Outreach and Charity (HAVOC) general board hosted an education and literacy panel on Nov. 17 which discussed libraries, the Common Core and the critical importance of early childhood literacy. The four panelists were Adjunct Professor Richard Hunt, Director of the Utica Public Library Darby O’Brien, America Reads Student Co-Director Erica Quach ’16, and Brian Sobotko ’16, head tutor at A Better Chance (ABC) House.

“I’m here to talk about the humanitarian imperative, which is the imperative to save lives. My team is constantly thinking, how can we help people? What can we be doing better?” began Michael Klosson ’71, vice president of policy and humanitarian response for Save the Children in his Nov. 12 lecture. The lecture, titled “The Humanitarian Imperative: Is the World Failing the Most Vulnerable? What's to be Done?” was an overview of Klosson’s work with Save the Children and of modern humanitarianism.

Narrative 4 (N4), an organization that aims to foster empathy through the power of storytelling, built emotional bonds in a powerful workshop on Nov. 5. The workshop, led by author and founder Colum McCann and executive director Lisa Consiglio, centered around empathy-driven social change. The crux of the workshop, and of N4’s mission, was “story exchange,” wherein two people share personal stories and then retell each other’s stories to the larger group. Consiglio defined N4 as being “founded for authors by authors, for writers by writers, and for educators by educators.”

In “The News and Information Future: It’s Not All Pandas and Puppies!” one family showed just how much the news media has changed not only between two generations but in the past decade. The Oct. 29 lecture was the first Spectator’s three-part journalism series, “SpecSpeak.”

It was a twist for John Rufo ’16 to find himself giving an interview rather than conducting one. The Senior Fellow is spending the year interviewing contemporary political poets through the lenses of race, gender, sexuality and disability. With a focus on younger poets, he hopes to open up a space for them to talk about their practice. Rufo, a creative writing major, took his project as an opportunity to merge his concentration with race and gender studies, sociology and history.

Novelist Zadie Smith held the Chapel audience captivated throughout the 2015 Tolles Lecture. Attendees hung onto her every word as she read what she called “Two Essays About Being A Person.”

During the Sept. 21 “Empowerment Thru Employment” presentation, Veronika Scott, CEO of Detroit non-profit The Empowerment Plan passionately battled misconceptions about homelessness. Her company, which hires individuals living in homeless shelters to make sleeping bag coats to be distributed to homeless people, emphasizes the importance of pride, independence and helping people help themselves. Hosted by the Days-Massolo Center, “Empowerment Thru Employment” was the second event of this semester’s “Media and Movement” series exploring the role of technology in social justice.