Gerald R. Ford Leadership Forum
by Jeff Polet In all the handwringing over so-called “populism,” much can be gleaned about our current politics when certain groups see their inferiors as exercising the franchise in the wrong way, meaning that the inferiors are pursuing their own interests rather than those of their more obviously enlightened counterparts. I haven’t watched television news …
by Jeff Polet This panic-inducing headline from a recent story in the NYTimes found analogues in most stories that reported on the recent release of national civics and history tests administered to 8th graders. An accompanying statement released by Education Secretary Miguel Cardona chalked up the decline to the ways in which the pandemic affected …
Is It Time to Panic About Civics and History Education? Read More »
by Jeff Polet One of the first lessons we learn in the Bible is that it is not good for man to be alone. This recent essay in the New York Times caught my attention because I think the author — the Surgeon General of the US — identifies what I regard as one of …
by Jeff Polet Back in October we at the Ford Leadership Forum partnered with Baylor University to host an event on fragility and resilience. These terms are very much in vogue these days, as is the profligate use of the word “trauma.” One can’t help but find it strange that the word trauma, which had …
by Jeff Polet I had at colleague at Hope College who was extremely liberal. I liked him very much, and we bonded early over our mutual love of classical music and opera — sort of the Scalia and Ginsburg of the college. Because we had developed a friendship with each other we also developed a …
by Jeff Polet Many of our cultural battles are intensified by our lack of imagination. We seldom display the sympathetic ability to put ourselves in our opponent’s shoes, meaning we typically don’t see them as moral actors but as immoral ones, forgetting that they don’t see themselves the same way. Surely there are persons whose …
by Jeff Polet Our series of reflection essays are less intended to inform than to spur thinking. They are not meant to be final statements so much as opening ones, subject to further reproof, correction, and criticism. Mainly, they are drawing our readers’ attention to essays that are interesting and well-written. I submit this preface …
by Jeff Polet One particularly irritating feature in American politics is the tendency to confuse surface-level symptoms with underlying causes, a habit especially pronounced in the last eight years. One consequence is that we tend to think if we can just alter one prominent facet (or figure), then somehow the body will be healed. I …
By Jeff Polet I’ll confess that in my youth I was often regarded as mischievous, a moniker I’ve never fully outgrown and one in which I take some perverse delight. At a forum such as ours, committed as it is to rejuvenating virtue, it would seem that mischief would have no place. So it was …
by Jeff Polet Having spent roughly 30 years of my career on a college campus I can attest to many changes that took place in that time, but none has been more prominent nor alarming than the mental health crisis among our young students. If I recall correctly, my alma mater had opened its counseling …
