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2008 Conference

Speakers

Dr. P. M. Forni
Professor, Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, Johns Hopkins University
Director, The Civility Initiative at Johns Hopkins

P.M. Forni is an award-winning professor at Johns Hopkins University, where he has taught for the past twenty years. He graduated from the University of Pavia in 1974 and received his Ph.D. in Italian at UCLA in 1981. He has written and edited several books on the work of Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375). He was a Fellow at Villa I Tatti, The Harvard Center for Renaissance Studies in Florence and is an Honorary Charter Member of the International Association of Protocol Consultants.

In 1997 Dr. Forni co-founded the Johns Hopkins Civility Project. An aggregation of academic and community outreach activities, the JHCP aimed at assessing the significance of civility, manners and politeness in contemporary society. He was also the co-director of "Reassessing Civility: Forms and Values at the End of the Century," an international symposium which took place at Hopkins in March 1998. He now directs The Civility Initiative at Johns Hopkins.

Over the years, he has continued to illustrate the connections among civility, ethics and quality of life. In his lectures and workhops he frequently talks about the rewards of fostering a culture of civility in today's workplace. His book Choosing Civility: The Twenty-Five Rules of Considerate Conduct (2002) has been translated into German and Italian. He contributed to a chapter on ethics and international protocol in the Convention Industry Council International Manual (2005). His article "The Other Side of Civility," appeared in the November, 2005 issue of Johns Hopkins Magazine. In 2008 he published The Civility Solution: What to Do When People Are Rude.

National and foreign publications that have mentioned his work include The New York Times, The Times of London, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, and Forbes Magazine. Dr. Forni has appeared on a number of radio and television shows, including the ABC's World News Tonight, CBS Sunday Morning, Oprah, and BBC's Outlook.

Dr. Edward Weisband
Edward S. Diggs Endowed Chair Professor, Department of Political Science, Virginia Tech
Princeton University, B.A., 1961, Stanford University, M.A., the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of the Johns Hopkins University, Ph.D., 1969

Professor Weisband holds the Edward S. Diggs Endowed Chair Professorship in the Department of Political Science of the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences and is also a member of the faculty of the Government and International Affairs Program of the Virginia Tech School of Public and International Affairs and a Senior Fellow of the Virginia Tech Institute for Governance and Accountability.

Throughout his career, Professor Weisband has devoted primary attention to teaching and pedagogy and is nationally recognized for contributions to distinguished teaching, especially of introductory subjects. In 1983, he was promoted to Distinguished Teaching Professor, a rank above full professor, by the State University of New York (SUNY), having received numerous citations for teaching excellence including the Danforth Foundation Associateship for Excellence in Teaching and the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Teaching Excellence in 1979. His reputation as a teaching scholar was further enhanced in 1987 when the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) in cooperation with the Carnegie Foundation, selected him as the Gold Medal Finalist in its National Professor of the Year competition. Professor Weisband also was named by CASE as the New York State Professor of the Year during the same year. In 1990, Professor Weisband inaugurated the Edward Singleton Diggs Endowed Chair at Virginia Tech. In 1992, he received the Philip and Sadie Sporn Award for Outstanding Teaching of Introductory Subjects and has also been cited twice by the Pi Sigma Alpha Political Science Honors Society as the outstanding professor of the year.

Dr. Laura Sjoberg
Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, Virginia Tech
Ph.D. University of Southern California, 2004
J.D., Boston College Law School, 2007
B.A., University of Chicago

Dr. Sjoberg's research focuses on gender and international security, including the impacts of war on women, the gendered nature of warfare, and women's participation in political violence. She has taught courses at the University of Southern California, Brandeis University, Merrimack College, and Duke University before coming to Virginia Tech.

Dr. Sjoberg's first book, Gender, Justice, and the Wars in Iraq (Rowman and Littlefield, 2006), presents a feminist reformulation of just war theory and an application of that reformulated theory to the wars in Iraq since the end of the Cold War. She is also author (with Caron Gentry) of Mothers, Monsters, and Whores: Women's Violence in Global Politics (Zed Books 2007). Her work has been published in International Studies Quarterly, the International Feminist Journal of Politics, Politics and Gender, International Relations, International Studies Perspectives, International Politics, International Studies Review, and the Austrian Journal of Political Science. Dr. Sjoberg edits a book series at New York University Press, "Gender and Political Violence."

Dr. Sjoberg is a member of Women In International Security (WIIS), the Women's Caucus for Political Science, the Women's Caucus for International Relations, the American Political Science Association, the International Studies Association, the American Bar Association, the New England Political Science Association, the Northeastern Political science association, the National Women's Studies Association, the Boston Consortium for Gender, Security, and Human Rights, the Consortium on Qualitative Research Methods, and the American Philosophical Association. She is a member of the editorial board for Feminist Theory and Gender Studies of the International Studies Compendium. She has served as a contributing editor to the Journal of Public and International Affairs. Dr. Sjoberg is currently serving as the president of the Western Region of the International Studies Association. She is also chair of the Feminist Theory and Gender Studies Section of the International Studies Association.

Dr. Charles W. Steger
President, Virginia Tech

Charles Steger is the 15th president of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Dr. Steger's passion for teaching led him to leave a career in the private sector as a professional architect and planner and return to Virginia Tech, his alma mater, to teach in the College of Architecture and Urban Studies. He subsequently served as Dean of that college and Vice President for Development and University Relations before being named President in 2000. Under President Steger's leadership, the university has charted a course to expand its research enterprise and establish Virginia Tech among the nation's top research universities.

Among his most recent publications are book chapters on the topics of the business of education and the university presidency. He is a Fellow in the American Institute of Architects. The New Century Technology Council awarded him its 2004 Compass Award for visionary thinking and leadership in the field of information technology. In 2006, he was invited to give a presentation on "Transforming Education to Meet Global Challenges" at the Public Services Summit@Nobel Week 2006 sponsored by Cisco Systems and the City of Stockholm.

He recently finished a term as chairman of the Virginia Council of Presidents and has been appointed by four Governors of Virginia to serve on various boards dealing with higher education, homeland security, information technology, and international education. In addition, he serves on the boards of a number of public and private organizations, including the Senior Advisory Group of the Northern Virginia Technology Council Board of Directors. He is also President of the Council of Presidents of the Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA) and Chairman of their Executive Committee.

Dr. Steger earned his bachelor and master's degrees in architecture and a Ph.D. in engineering at Virginia Tech.

Dr. Edward F. D. Spencer
Vice President for Student Affairs, Virginia Tech

Dr. Edward F. D. Spencer was appointed Vice President for Student Affairs on November 1, 2008. He provides leadership and oversight for the 15 departments in the Division of Student Affairs, including areas such as housing and dining, career services, student activities, student health services, recreational sports, and the corps of cadets.

He received a B.A. in psychology from the University of Rochester, an M.A. in student personnel administration in higher education from Syracuse University, and both an M.A. and Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Delaware. He is also a graduate of Harvard University's Management Development Program.

Dr. Spencer began his professional career in student affairs at the University of Delaware in 1970 where he held three different positions. He came to Virginia Tech in 1983 as Director of Housing and Residence Life, became Director of Residential and Dining Programs in 1989, was named Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs in 1996, and, subsequently, Associate Vice President in 2004 and Interim Vice President in 2008. While working in student affairs at the University of Delaware, he taught several undergraduate courses and now, at Virginia Tech, he regularly teaches the graduate course "The American College Student and the College Environment."

Dr. Spencer's awards include: Dissertation of the Year from the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators; Most Outstanding Faculty Advisor, Most Outstanding Chapter Advisor, and the Order of Constantine from the Sigma Chi International Fraternity; and Executive of the Year from the New River Valley Chapter of the International Association of Administrative Professionals. Additionally, Virginia Tech's annual Fraternity Advisor of the Year Award is named the Spencer Award in his honor. Dr. Spencer is known for a variety of professional publications and presentations, and serves on many local, regional, and national committees and organizations. In recent years he has concentrated his presentations and consultations on: the nature of today's college students, tragedy and recovery at Virginia Tech, principles of team-building, building and renovating residence halls and Greek housing, student judicial systems, and organizational models.

Dr. David G. Brown
Provost and Professor Emeritus
Wake Forest University

David Brown is founding coordinator of the ACCIAC and Provost-Emeritus from Wake Forest. David G. Brown has served as resident at three universities (Georgia College & State University, University of North Carolina at Asheville, Transylvania University) and as provost at three universities (Wake Forest, Miami University of Ohio, and Drake). His teaching career includes the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1961-67) and (part-time) at North Carolina Central University and St. Augustine College.

Brown seeded the Asheville Institute on General Education, sponsored the first national conference on undergraduate research, and founded the university's Center for Creative Retirement.

Brown has been recognized as an "inspirational teacher of undergraduates" by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His classes at Wake Forest have been featured on the front page of The New York Times, broadcast as a special on the BBC, and written up in the Chronicle of Higher Education, USA Today, and Business Week.

Trained as an economist at Denison University and Princeton University, Brown has consulted with more than 300 colleges and universities in 17 countries regarding their use of technology in the classroom and administratively. He has authored and edited six books on technology and teaching.

Brown has chaired several national groups including the American Association for Higher Education, Higher Education Colloquium, the American Council on Education's Council of Chief Academic Officers, and the Academic Council of the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges.

His most recent book, University Presidents as Moral Leaders (Praeger) was released by the American Council on Education in January, 2006. Leadership is also the focus of several earlier books: The Mobile Professors and Leadership Vitality.