University Honors Program Blog
Intellectual Omnivores Unite
You are invited to the annual UHP Honors Research Showcase! Come learn something new and support your peers as they present their brief talks followed by questions.
The Research Showcase will be on Friday, April 26th from 1-3pm in the Club Room at the Townhouse. Let your fellow UHPers know how proud we are of their dedication and hard work as researchers and scholars!
Questions? Contact Brianna Crayton (bcrayton@gwu.edu).
Already getting sick of the city life? Eager to explore beyond E and K streets? Love the smell of the Shenandoah river in the morning? Hike with the Honors Program!
On Sunday, April 7th, the Honors Program is hosting a $7 hike with the honors community and certified TRAiLS guides. We’re going to Old Rag. The Old Rag hike is a trademark favorite for DC hikers and features challenging rock scrambles and stunning views of the Shenandoah valley. Located in the heart of Shenandoah National Park the mountain trail has a fun 2 mile section of scrambling and sliding through and around granite boulders on the way to the summit.
We will be meeting at 8:30AM at the Honors townhouse and breakfast will provided before we get on the bus. We will hike the 9 mile loop that extends around Old Rag which features narrow passageways, rock scrambles, and gorgeous views of the Shenandoah valley. Lunch will be provided. After completing the 9 mile circuit we will drive back to campus arriving approximately at 6:00 PM.
| Love Your Neighbor: Jews, Christians, and the Meaning of a Very Elusive Commandment Thursday, March 285:00-7:00 pm Marvin Center, 301 Description: The biblical mandate to “love your neighbor as yourself” is frequently held up in Jewish sources as “the great principle of the Torah.” Yet its meaning is elusive: just what is the verse asking for? Does “love” refer to emotion, action, or some combination of the two? If the Bible has emotion in mind, what kind of emotion are we talking about? Surely people aren’t called to love their neighbor in the same way they love their spouse or their children, so what kind of love *does* the Bible ask for? We’ll explore the ways an array of traditional Jewish thinkers and modern biblical scholars has wrestled with these questions. We’ll also probe the very different ways Jews and Christians have often heard the Bible’s charge, and we’ll ask what we might learn about these two religious traditions and the relationship between them from their contrasting approaches to this all-important verse. Speaker Bio: Rabbi Shai Held–theologian, scholar, and educator–is President, Dean, and Chair in Jewish Thought at Hadar. Previously, he served for six years as Scholar-in-Residence at Kehilat Hadar in New York City, and taught both theology and Jewish law at the Jewish Theological Seminary. He also served as a campus rabbi at Harvard University. A 2011 recipient of the prestigious Covenant Award for excellence in Jewish education, Rabbi Held has been named multiple times to Newsweek’s list of the 50 most influential rabbis in America and to the Forward’s list of the 50 most influential Jews in the world. He holds a doctorate in religion from Harvard; his main academic interests are in modern Jewish and Christian thought, in biblical theology, and in the history of Zionism. Rabbi Held’s first book, Abraham Joshua Heschel: The Call of Transcendence, was published by Indiana University Press in 2013; The Heart of Torah, a collection of essays on the Torah in two volumes, was published by JPS in 2017. He is currently at work on a book about the centrality of love in Jewish theology, spirituality, and ethics, to be published by Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. |
Come celebrate Presidents’ Day weekend in the UHP Townhouse at 11am on Saturday, February 16. We’ll have breakfast sandwiches, bring yourself and your friends!
RSVP here: https://www.facebook.com/events/282545999080940/
Dear Local PBK Leaders,
Happy New Year! We hope you had a relaxing holiday season and a good start to the Spring semester.
I wanted to share an internship opportunity in our national office for this Spring. This paid opportunity is open to students and recent graduates and we would love to hire someone from one of our local chapters. While Phi Beta Kappa membership is not required, preference will be given to members.
While we have had interns in the national office for several years, this is the first time we are specifically hiring a Digital Media intern. This individual will help us with the online storytelling and marketing of Phi Beta Kappa on our social media channels and website. A major project will be conceptualization and creation of video content for social media.
The ideal candidate for this position is someone who is passionate about their liberal arts or sciences education, has experience with social media, is creative, a strong writer, and good team player. If you know any current students or recent graduates who would be a good fit, please forward them the attached job description. The deadline for applications is January 25th.
Please let me know if you have any questions, and thank you for sharing this with your students!
All Best,
Laura
