Education, Purpose and Human Flourishing in Uncertain Times

We’re sharing information about these seminars which will be of interest to cluster members:

This theme explores the dialectical relationship between mind and environment. It looks at what is meant by ‘Human Flourishing’ and explores amongst others such concepts as character, wellbeing, and virtue. We ask how education might be pressed into service in the development of human traits, what other support systems are needed in micro and local settings such as homes and schools, and importantly, the role of education in dismantling the factors that constrain the pathways towards human flourishing.

The following seminars will be given at 5pm on Tuesdays in the Investcorp Lecture Theatre, St Antony’s College with the exception of 9th February when it will start at 6pm. These seminars are open to the public, and can be joined virtually on the following MS Teams link: Click here to join the meeting.

Conveners: Dr David Johnson, Dr Fiona Gatty and Ms Luana Deborst

Professor Hanan Alexander, University of Haifa, Professor Tali Tal, Technion: Israel Institute of Technology, and Dr Rachel S. A. Pear, University of Haifa
19 Jan: ‘Dialogue between Science Education and Religious Education: Evolution Instruction, Pedagogy of Difference, and Human Flourishing.’

Dr Edward Brooks and Katy Granville-Chapman
26 Jan: ‘Reimagining educational leadership – empowering human flourishing.’

Professor Kristján Kristjánsson, Jubilee Centre, University of Birmingham
2 Feb: ‘Four Accounts of Flourishing as the Aim of Education: A Synthesis and Ten Remaining Problems.’

Professor Tyler VanderWeele, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University 
9 Feb: ‘Flourishing and Education.’
Please note that this seminar will take place at 6PM.

Denise Kohlhepp, University of Cambridge 
16 Feb: ‘Investigating physical activity and parental psychosocial stress as modifying resilience and risk factors on the coupling between cognition and mental health.’

Dr Tom Harrison, Jubilee Centre, University of Birmingham
23 Feb: ‘Character education; what might it contribute to human flourishing?’

TWCF Visiting Fellow, Professor Emily Choge, Moi University
2 Mar: ‘Personhood and Society: the making of a Kenyan Man and Woman. A Comparative Study.’

Dr Jonathan Beale, Eton College
9 Mar: ‘The Role of Human Flourishing in Education: Should Flourishing be Realistically Attainable or an Ideal to which We Aspire?’