Since its inception, the DCI has participated in Davidson’s daylong celebration of student intellectual achievement called the Verna Miller Case (VMC) Symposium. DCI Fellows have presented posters and given presentations on the work of the DCI, and it has been a great opportunity for them to share their work with the Davidson community.
This year we wanted to do something a little more dynamic and interactive to capture the spirit and ethos of the DCI. And so a team of Fellows got together and designed an hour-long event that actively demonstrated the DCI’s key features and contributions to creating a more deliberative culture on and off campus.
It included a mock deliberation on the relationship between free speech and inclusion that highlighted moves that both deliberators and facilitators can make to foster more productive deliberations. The mock deliberation did not shy away from engaging with some of the most contentious aspects of the issue at hand, but tried to demonstrate how we can engage constructively and respectfully with them.
The event also included short summaries by the Fellows about their deliberation projects that they designed on issues important to them personally. It concluded with an opportunity for audience members to deliberate among themselves on a range of different topics.
The event wonderfully displayed the range and depth of deliberation that the Fellows engaged in and the set of skills they learned over the course of the 2023-24 academic year. It nicely complemented the other types of amazing work highlighted by the Symposium that Davidson students engage in on campus, from research in the social sciences, natural sciences, and humanities to achievements in the performing and visual arts to collaborations with local communities and organizations on pressing social challenges.
In many ways, the DCI brings together these different threads of the liberal arts – rigorous research, creative work, and civic engagement – and applies them to the critical project of fostering constructive conversations across differences on issues that matter deeply to our society.
Check out the video highlights of the DCI’s symposium event below. It features an introduction to the Deliberative Citizenship Initiative by DCI Senior Fellow and Co-Convener Laegan Smith ’24 followed by a mock deliberation featuring Laegan, Stephen Walker ’26, Emre Guvenilir ’25, Auden White ’26, Mishti Mookherjee ’27, and Arshi Hussain ’26. These and other DCI Fellows then introduce their personal deliberation projects. Check it out – it’s a great way to learn about the incredible work that Davidson students are doing as part of the DCI.
