csrhc

ENID, Okla. – Theodore Roosevelt will come alive in Enid for one evening when Dr. J. Rufus Fears, the David Ross Boyd professor of classics at the University of Oklahoma, will return to Enid for a new series of lectures entitled “Lessons in Leadership through the Great Books.”

The first lecture will be held at 7 p.m., Sept. 14 at Montgomery Hall on the campus of Northern Oklahoma College Enid. The presentation is open to the public free of charge.

Fears will discuss “Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography” for the first in a series of lessons based on the Great Books. Future lectures will take place in Montgomery Hall at 7 pm and will include William Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar,” Oct. 12; Homer’s “The Iliad,” Nov. 9; Machiavelli’s “The Prince,” Jan. 11; and Elie Wiesel’s “Night,” Feb. 8.

Fears’ discussions of the Great Books have appeared in newspapers across the country and have aired on national television and radio programs.

Fears holds the G.T. and Libby Blankenship Chair in the History of Liberty. He also currently serves as David and Ann Brown Distinguished Fellow of the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs. He earned his Ph.D. from Harvard University.

Fears is an acclaimed teacher and scholar who has won 25 awards for teaching excellence including the Medal for Excellence in College and University Teaching from the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence, the University Continuing Education Association (UCEA) Great Plains Region Award for Excellence in Teaching and the UCEA’s National Award for Teaching Excellence.

Cherokee Strip Regional Heritage Center named Fears as scholar in residence for the educational arm of the Heritage Center, the Leadership Institute. In this capacity he leads the Heritage Center in a variety of educational programs to teach leadership principles exemplified by those who settled the Cherokee Strip and through their perseverance developed northwest Oklahoma into a prosperous region with strong family values. A main goal of Heritage Center Leadership Institute is to reach thousands of school children in this region and beyond through teachers sharing the knowledge they have gained through these educational opportunities.

Fears will be teaching the Educator’s Leadership Institute June 7 to 10. The program will be a four-day educator’s seminar, “America’s Legacy of Leadership,” as a three-credit, graduate-level course. Fears will be teaching his Legacy of Leadership series based on leadership in America since the Civil War. Field trips highlighting leaders in the Cherokee Strip will be scheduled each afternoon.

Scholarships to cover all costs of the seminar are available through CSRHC until May 10, 2010 with class registration open through June.

The four-day educator’s seminar will provide an opportunity for kindergarten through 12th grade teachers to learn lessons of leadership based on Civil War leaders’ experiences and discover how these lessons can be applied across the curriculum at all levels. This opportunity emphasizes the importance of learning from leaders of the past to help mold our country’s future heroes in school systems today.
Fears’ books and monographs include “The Cult of Jupiter and Roman Imperial Ideology” and “The Theology of Victory at Rome.” He has edited a three-volume edition of “Selected Writings of Lord Acton.”

For more information or to register, contact Andi Holland, president of the CSRHC, at 234-8999 or visit the center’s Web site, www.regionalheritagecenter.org.