Western Conversations Conference this weekend

This weekend, Santa Clara will be hosting the 2010 Western Conversations conference. The six Jesuit institutions of higher education on the west coast will encourage discussion between faculty members about the changing role of Jesuit education in a transforming society.

Each school will send between eight and ten faculty members to participate in the discussion. Santa Clara accepts tenure or tenure-tracked professors as well as senior lecturers and administration staff who play a key role in the intellectual life of the school. Santa Clara also selects applicants who have not participated in the Western Conference before in order to promote more understanding of Jesuit education.

The theme of this year's conference will be "Sustainability and Environmental Justice on Jesuit Campuses." The conference is intended to promote understanding of the topic of sustainability as well as to foster the inter-collegiate community of the six western Jesuit campuses. The conference is also intended to strengthen faculty awareness and understanding of the historical implications of Jesuit education.

The keynote speaker for this year's Western Conversations is Kristin Schrader-Frechette, a professor of biological sciences and philosophy at Notre Dame University where she also directs the Center for Environmental Justice and Children's Health. Schrader-Frechette has garnered several awards and recognitions in the academic community, including the World Technology Award in Ethics. She is widely sought after as a lecturer by universities and government groups around the world.

The focus of Schrader-Frechette's lecture will be environmental injustice and how society imposes environmental burdens on the vulnerable for our own convenience. She will show how there is a moral justice-based duty to fight environmental injustice.