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Facilitator:  Dr. Michael A. Denner ([email protected])

Description and Objectives

The goal is for you to generate a framework you will use to make good decisions for building a rewarding career at Stetson and way of life.

We also address questions of Social Responsibility, mostly in our historical analysis of working and careers throughout history. What do we owe one another? Must our work be our identity and our measure?

In important ways, our central text is a funny book called Leading Lives That Matter, by a couple evangelical Lutherans from Valparaiso. It’s an explicitly Christian book with readings that stretch from the 4th century BCE to the end of the 20th century. The readings are brilliant, they ask and try to answer really big questions like To Whom Shall I Listen? And Are Some Lives More Significant? These are questions you ask, or will ask soon. Asking BIG questions and thinking through answers… that’s the explicit and implicit function of college. You might not like the answers sometimes. That’s OK.

We end the course with a discussion of the future of work and leisure… and then, with Leo Tolstoy, we throw it all on the ground and wonder at the beauty of its broken fragments.

Over the last decade, Stetson has cancelled class due to hurricanes 40% of the time. Every time it’s been different — sometimes we have “virtual class” and, maybe, the scheduled readings and activities don’t change. Sometimes, they’ve cancelled classes and everyone gets all consternated and unhappy — syllabi are rewritten, students get confused, teachers get angry. I avoid this problem by scheduling only the first few weeks of the fall semester. Once we’re “free and clear” of imminent destruction, I’ll release the final weeks of schedule. Everyone is happy! Here’s a weekly schedule of our meetings for the first few weeks… Make sure you “click through”!

Weekly Schedule FSEM 2024

Components & Definitions

#9. Our flaws make us human; steer toward yours. I steer toward mine. That won’t always be rewarded in “the real world.” #10. “The real world” isn’t the real world.