College Receives $500,000 Gift for Institute for the Liberal Arts

Founded in 2000, the institute promotes the continued vitality of the liberal arts tradition in American higher education. Toward this end, it hosts annual Conversations on the Liberal Arts that bring together educators from colleges and universities nationwide.

“We are deeply grateful to the Fletcher Jones Foundation for supporting our commitment to the liberal arts,” President Stan D. Gaede said. “The institute fills a gap in American higher education by providing a forum for discussing the most fundamental questions facing the liberal arts tradition. Westmont seeks to create a hospitable place where participants can address these foundational issues with substance and meaning.”

“Through the work of the institute, Westmont has an opportunity to serve the larger world of higher education while sharpening our own educational vision,” Provost Shirley Mullen said. “Given that it is fairly rare for foundations to provide funds for endowment, this gift from Fletcher Jones represents a vote of confidence in both Westmont and the institute,” she added. “We are well on our way toward building an endowment that will permanently fund the institute.”

The institute’s annual Conversations on the Liberal Arts have featured topics such as “Educating for Justice,” “Vocation, Vocationalism and the Liberal Arts” and “The Sciences as Liberal Arts.” Speakers have included leading scholars: liberal arts education champion Robert Erburu; historian of education Bruce Kimball; Cambridge literary scholar Dame Gillian Beer; Carnegie Foundation senior scholar William Sullivan; and Yale philosopher Nicholas Woltersdorff. Participants have represented premier colleges and universities, including Yale, Georgetown, Emory, Stanford, UC Santa Barbara, Pomona, Claremont McKenna and Occidental.

The institute will launch a collaborative pilot project with the University of LaVerne later this year, funded by a $50,000 matching grant from the Foundation for Independent Higher Education and the UPS National Venture Fund. The Liberal Arts Ambassadors will involve underrepresented students from liberal arts institutions working through existing college preparation programs to explain the benefits of a liberal arts education to underrepresented junior high and high school students.

In 2002, the Fletcher Jones Foundation gave Westmont a $500,000 lead grant for state-of-the-art science equipment for the future David K. Winter Hall for the Sciences. The first Fletcher Jones grant toWestmont in 1981 supported a student loan fund. Subsequent gifts have provided science equipment and technology-related upgrades. The foundation was established in 1969 by Fletcher Jones, the co-founder of Computer Services Corp.

For more information, contact Nancy Phinney, director of public affairs, at (805) 565-6055 or e-mail nphinney@westmont.edu.