Chautauqua Institution today announced that Sherra Babcock, longtime vice president and Emily and Richard Smucker Chair for Education, will retire from her post in October 2017. A familiar figure on the Chautauqua grounds, Babcock is probably best known for her frequent appearances onstage as moderator at lecture and literary arts programming throughout each summer season. Over more than a decade of visionary leadership, she has shepherded Chautauqua’s signature and historic lecture and literary arts platforms to new levels of excellence and renown. She joined the Institution in 2007 as director of education and was appointed to her current position, the...
Chautauqua Institution today announced that the Rev. Robert M. Franklin Jr., director of religion, will step down from his post following the 2017 season.Franklin has served Chautauqua in his current capacity since 2014. He has been an active participant in the Institution’s religious programming since 2001, serving as lecturer, chaplain, theologian-in-residence, adviser to the Institution’s Abrahamic program, and as a member of the Institution’s board of trustees. His decision coincides with continued expansion of his responsibilities at Emory University, where he serves as a senior advisor to the president and James T. and Berta R. Laney Chair in Moral Leadership...
The Chautauqua Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Chautauqua Institution, proudly announces having received gifts and commitments of $103.5 million during the course of its six-year Promise Campaign, exceeding the original goal by more than $5 million. Concluded Dec. 31, 2016, the Promise Campaign commenced in 2011 with a series of objectives intended to implement Chautauqua Institution’s 2010–18 strategic plan. That strategic plan calls for an increase in the number of patrons to Chautauqua’s programs and improvements to the Chautauqua experience, especially in ways that would maintain affordability, provide access to new visitors, preserve its intergenerational culture, include new and divergent...
Good morning, and thank you for assembling in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King. The title of today’s service, “We Still Have a Dream,” is a particularly salient one for the times in which we find ourselves, and, quite frankly, is the right emphasis for where we find ourselves in January 2017. We gather in this sanctuary to honor the legacy of one of the most important civil rights leaders in recent memory. As many of you know, I count my second home as Washington, D.C. If you find yourself there, you simply must go visit the King Memorial on...