There are an increasing number of programs across the country organizing public discourse opportunities on college campuses. With such a proliferation, there is a risk that they all go in disparate directions, re-inventing the wheel and not learning from one another. Fortunately, several efforts have also been underway to facilitate sharing and cross-fertilization across these different programs so that lessons can be learned and promising practices can be identified together.
One of these efforts has been run by the Greater Good Science Center (GGSC), which is based out of the University of California, Berkeley. For the last several years, GGSC has run a Bridging Differences in Higher Education Learning Fellowship for higher education faculty and staff to develop or strengthen a project to foster healthier dialogue and understanding across divides at their school.
During the 2023-24 academic year, the DCI’s Faculty Director, Dr. Graham Bullock, participated in the GGSC’s Project-Based Cohort, which included small groups of campus leaders who exchanged ideas and provided feedback related to their existing initiatives. The group has continued to stay connected through the GGSC’s Bridging Differences Alumni Network, which is made up of faculty and staff who have gone through the fellowship program. It also hosts regular presentations by leaders in the field who share their insights about how to stimulate constructive conversations across differences on college campuses.
Professor Bullock was invited in the spring of 2025 to provide an overview of the Deliberative Citizenship Initiative to the Network and share what he has been working on as its Faculty Director. In the interests of stimulating further learning and collaboration across higher education (and beyond), we have posted Dr. Bullock’s presentation below. This video was originally recorded by the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley under their Bridging Differences in Higher Education Learning Fellowship. You can learn more about their work via their online magazine, Greater Good.
