You’ve probably heard of Ursinus’ faculty lecture program, the Baden presentations. If you’ve been free on a Thursday afternoon and one’s caught your eye, maybe you’ve even gone to one and learned about what one of our beloved professors has been up to in their research. But what is a Baden presentation, and why does Ursinus run them?
According to the College-run Instagram account @whatsup_ursinus and archived copies of the Ursinus Weekly, Baden presentations were named after Dr. William Wilson “Boots” Baden, who taught Greek, Spanish, French, and German at Ursinus from 1914 until his passing in 1924. However, the story doesn’t end with him; the “William Wilson Baden Faculty Presentation Series” was founded in Baden’s honor more than sixty years after his death by his son, credited on Ursinus’ website only as W. Wilson Baden (‘19), in 1986. That’s almost forty years of Baden presentations!
According to physics Professor Tom Carroll, member of the Promotion and Tenure Committee (and, says Assistant Professor Doron Taussig, “a great guy and a decent basketball player)” faculty members give Baden presentations any time they return from a sabbatical. Most commonly – though not always – these talks are given by tenure-track professors who have taken their pre-tenure sabbatical, during which they’ve pursued research they’re passionate about and excited to share with the rest of the Ursinus community. Carroll, who has taught at other academic institutions like Bryn Mawr and Swarthmore, says that, as far as he’s seen, this is a practice unique to Ursinus; most other faculty lecture series are either limited to a handful of professors or to in-department attendance. Neither of these restrictions apply to Baden lectures — in fact, the presentations are open to not just faculty, but students, and even the wider Collegeville community.
He sees Baden lectures as a “free way to learn about a cool topic [he] doesn’t know about,” and says that he goes to the lectures whenever he can, regardless of whether any given talk is by a professor who’s being considered for tenure. More than that, they bring the faculty together and foster a sense of community and interdisciplinary intellectual development, “in the spirit of CIE.” Finally, Baden presentations are a way for pre-tenure faculty to engage with tenured faculty and practice sharing the research they’re so passionate about. “I’m not sure I’ve ever gone to a Baden lecture… and come away disappointed [or n]ot having learned something.”
Taussig, who is faculty advisor for The Grizzly – and, according to Carroll, “the best basketball player [in the faculty-staff pickup game],” if and only if playing halfcourt – offers another perspective. On October 24th, he gave a Baden presentation entitled “The People Who Hate The News (and why they hate it).” Taussig took a pre-tenure sabbatical last year to do research on the relationship between conservatives, “news abstainers,” and professional journalism. As part of his research, he had the opportunity to run focus groups with people who don’t engage with the news. Then, he returned to Ursinus and gave a Baden presentation. Taussig feels that Baden lectures, “[help] cultivate the intellectual environment of the college… We share the research we’re doing with each other… in conversations across disciplines.” Overall, he says, he’s glad he had the opportunity to give a Baden lecture, and he regards it as a very positive experience.
Both Taussig and Carroll also commented on student attendance at Baden presentations. While the lectures are aimed at faculty, Taussig recalled how questions and comments from students brought new perspectives to the conversation around his presentation, and Carroll said that, in his time at Ursinus, he’s seen more and more students in attendance, and attributes the shift to increased engagement between faculty and students. When asked if he thought students should attend, he had one clear answer: “Definitely.”