Wolfe Institute Spring 2020 Online Speaker Series
Professor Rosamond King
This spring, COVID-19 closed the campus, but it did not deter Rosamond King, director of the Ethyle R. Wolfe Institute for the Humanities, from carrying out the institute's mission to "support all forms of academic discourse at Brooklyn College by sponsoring lectures, seminars, and study groups with the aim of keeping public conversation in touch with advances in the humanities and social sciences." Understanding that our students needed to maintain a robust academic experience, Professor King created and designed what she termed a "Rapid Response Program," a speaker series that was administered with support from the Office of the Dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
King scheduled more than 25 speakers from all fields who presented Zoom lectures to classes in every school at the college. The astounding roster of talented speakers, lecturing to such a wide variety of courses in all schools, reminds us of the central role of the humanities in sustaining the intellectual spark of the college. Among the speakers were well-known leaders in their fields, including two Brooklyn College alumni. The speaker series reached more than 500 students, with the largest being the 160-person "Introduction to Finance" class in the School of Business.
David Zyla, author of Color Your Style
The diversity of invited speakers was truly amazing. Some were practicing artists and media personalities such as Kristin Meinzer, award-winning writer, host, producer, and cultural critic; alumna Alyssa Paolicelli, on-air reporter for NY1 Spectrum News; Andrew Adam Newman, a senior editor for the popular podcast "Studio 360"; Shia Levitt, independent reporter for National Public Radio; Sean and Terry Torrington, co-founders and owners of SLAY.TV, a leader in independent LGBTQ of color television; and artist, record producer, and community organizer Val Geng Bernstein. Arts professionals included Annie Simon, film, TV, theater, and opera costume designer; and David Zyla, costume designer and author of Color Your Style.
There were writers and poets such as Emmy Award–winning filmmaker and screenwriter Andrew Cohn and award-winning poet Willie Perdomo as well as Dr. Lucia Morgado Palacin, a cancer biologist researching micropepticides and microproteins from Columbia University.
In the field of education, King invited Debbie Almontaser, activist and veteran New York City public school teacher; Carla España, bilingual education specialist; Luz Yadira Herrera, assistant professor of multilingual and multicultural education at California State University-Fresno; Susan L. Recchia, professor emeritus of Teachers College at Columbia University; Gina Tesorio, research assistant for Learning Sciences and Human Development at the University of Washington; and E. Dale Smith-Gallo, assessment specialist and director at the Urban Assembly School for Performing Arts.
Imani Jones poster
Bill Feingold
Students were treated to talks by corporate and business leaders such as Vikas Satay, senior director of marketing at Heineken Corporation; Stephen Sun of Valley National Bank; and financial expert Bill Feingold, a frequent guest expert for venues including #CNBC, The Wall Street Journal, and Bloomberg News who talked about stocks and bonds in Emile Westergaard's 160-person School of Business class, Introduction to Corporate Finance. One notable presenter was Brooklyn College graduate Imani Jones '16, founder of Find Your ID NYC talent agency, who talked about entrepreneurship and navigating the fashion industry during the time of COVID-19 in Assistant Professor Ngoc Cindy Pham's international business class.
Finally, HSS and the Wolfe Institute brought in activists such as attorney and black trans activist, Kylar Broadus, the first black openly transgender delegate to the Democratic National Convention; Benjamin Rosenfield, organizer with the Crown Heights Tenants Union; and former FEMA emergency responder Constantina Weil, who is currently volunteering to help with New York City's COVID-19 outbreak.
Congratulations to the Wolfe Institute for maintaining a stimulating academic atmosphere for the college community in the face of this semester's difficult and challenging circumstances.
