On Sept. 22 and 23, President Carl Strikwerda and Reverend Chaplain Tracy Wenger Sadd gave presentations at the fourth White House convening of the President’s Interfaith and Community Service Challenge at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
Strikwerda spoke on a panel about how and why college and university presidents should make interfaith education and cooperation a priority on our campuses across the nation. Sadd was asked to present about the comprehensive approach for interfaith understanding, service and leadership that Elizabethtown College has implemented on campus since 2001. She explained how interfaith, understanding service and leadership have been the pursuit of the College in both co-curricular and curricular activities, since it is a priority in the College’s strategic plan, which includes a four-year action plan for its implementation.
The interfaith service involves people from different religious and non-religious backgrounds tackling community challenges together. Over 250 institutions of higher education are taking part in the President’s Interfaith Cooperation and Community Service initiative. The Challenge asks institutions of higher education to participate in an initiative to commit to a year of interfaith and community service programming on campus.
Etown was one of the first 250 to participate in the challenge in 2011 with the integration of 24 events and program and cooperation with 33 campus partners and 35 community partners or participants. Etown has made strides in interfaith engagement with features such as engaging interfaith youth core consultants for an eight-month asses mapping, including surveys and focus groups of faculty, staff members and students, resulting in data for the campus culture. Etown’s participation in the challenge also resulted in a 30-item interfaith strategic plan for the College, which included having Eboo Patel, the CEO and founder of Interfaith Youth Core as the 2013 commencement speaker. In addition, Sadd, Professor of Religion and Asian Studies Dr. Jeffery Long and Associate Professor of Sociology Dr. Michele Kozimor-King went to the New York University Conference for creating new interdisciplinary studies minor, and Director of International Business and Turnbull-Jamieson Professor of Finance and International Business Dr. Hossein Varamini attended the Council of Independent Colleges/ IFYC Luce-funded faculty summer seminar, Teaching Interfaith Across the Disciplines.
“While religious and non-religious beliefs and practices are very important parts of our most private and personal lives, it seems clear to me that we cannot solve many of the problems in the world in the 21st century unless we engage both ourselves and our local and global neighbors in the fullness of our beliefs, traditions and practices, not only culturally, but also religiously,” Sadd said.
She believes that it’s important for students to learn in an environment that promotes interfaith. “We are a college committed to alumni who live both professionally and personally lives of leadership and service for a better world. How can we adequately prepare students to do that if we fail to teach interfaith literacy, cooperation, understanding and leadership?”
In addition, Etown was one of the 25 colleges and universities in the Vanguard Network of schools at the cutting edge of national leadership related to interfaith education and leadership in both the curriculum and the co-curriculum according to Interfaith Youth Core. Strikwerda, Sadd and Assistant Chaplain Amy Shorner-Johnson also attended an invitation-only first Vanguard Network convening at Georgetown University on Sunday, Sept. 21.
Further interfaith engagement in the school year includes events such as “Better Together Day” in April, a formation of an Interfaith Student council, reading groups for “Faitheist,” a book by the Secular Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University, Freedom Seder, a proposal to form a Secular Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University and speed faithing.