Year: 2015

Todd Breyfogle, Director of Seminars at The Aspen Institute and Chair of the American Academy for Liberal Education (AALE) served as a keynote speaker at the first Alliance for Liberal Learning Conference (ALL) held in Chicago November 6-7, 2015. Breyfogle has served on the AALE Board of Trustees since 2009 and was elected Chair in 2013. The ALL conference brought together representatives from educational organizations, schools and colleges with formal great books and core texts curricula, residential and travel learning programs, and degree-granting and non-degree granting programs, who share a common interest in the value of lifelong liberal education. Breyfogle’s presentation, entitled Navigating the Contours of Complexity, addressed the contemporary relevance of liberal learning in clarifying professional and personal priorities as part of a lifelong journey of learning.

The Alliance for Liberal Learning was founded in 2014/2015 when representatives working in discussion-based liberal education met in Chicago to discuss common challenges and opportunities. The mission of the new initiative (www.allianceforliberallearning.org) is to increase public awareness, understanding and appreciation for lifelong liberal education through enhanced collaborations.

The American Academy for Liberal Education (AALE) has moved its national office to Washington DC effective November 1, 2015. The move once again situates AALE in the Nation’s capital. The Board of Trustees approved the relocation in an effort to place its administrative operations in a more convenient location to conduct business with various national educational associations, non-profits, and government departments. The new national office also provides a more centralized location for AALE’s work with international institutions and organizations of higher learning. The new address of AALE’s national office is: 1200 G Street NW, Suite 833, Washington DC 20005.

The American Academy for Liberal Education (AALE) Board of Trustees is pleased to announce the appointment of Diane Auer Jones to the position of President. Ms. Auer Jones joined the AALE Board in 2009 and has served as Secretary of the Board since 2010. Auer Jones has been instrumental in refining AALE accreditation policies and has provided strong leadership during AALE’s most recent strategic planning effort focusing on a soon-to-be released new AALE membership and value statement. 

Ms. Diane Auer Jones is currently the President of AJsquared Consulting which services clients from the elementary school to the post-secondary level providing counsel on a range of educational issues including charter school development, post-secondary assessment practices, and on-line learning. She has served as Senior Vice-President for External and Regulatory Affairs at the Career Education Corporation, Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education, Director of Government Affairs at Princeton University and was CEO of The Washington Campus, a non-profit organization that serves as the Washington, DC campus for 16 of the nation’s leading graduate schools of business. A molecular biologist by training, Ms. Auer Jones is a graduate of Salisbury University, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in biology, and of the University of Maryland Baltimore County, where she completed a master’s degree in Applied Molecular Biology and doctoral coursework in Cellular and Molecular Biology.

In the coming months Ms. Auer Jones will guide plans to expand AALE’s scope of accreditation to better address the needs of current and new members. She will lead initiatives to develop new membership services particularly in ways that support innovation in liberal education including learning models, delivery models, cost models and admission practices and in establishing quality assessments that align institutional mission and goals, and liberal arts learning objectives. 

The American Academy for Liberal Education (AALE) held annual elections on June 12, 2015. The Board of Trustees welcomes for a first-term of office on the Board, Robert Eitel and for a first-term of office on the Council of Scholars, Robert A. Manzer. Returning to the Council of Scholars for a second-term is Joseph M. Knippenberg.

Mr. Robert Eitel is Vice President of Federal Regulatory Affairs and Compliance at Bridgepoint Education Inc. (Washington DC). Mr. Eitel has an extensive background in the area of education and employment law. In his position as a member of Talbert and Eitel, P.L.L.C., he provided legal, policy and strategic advice on key legislation and regulations, and guidance affecting elementary and secondary education and post-secondary institutions, the student loan industry and other groups with an interest in education. While serving as Deputy General Counsel for the U.S. Department of Education, Eitel supervised the Division of Business and Administrative Law and the Division of Legislative Counsel. He managed the Department’s bill drafting and legal review before Congress and provided legal advice on reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act and the Higher Education Act. In his most recent position as Vice President of Regulatory Operations at Career Education Corporation he worked to ensure that nationally and regionally accredited campus institutions operated in accordance with federal, state, accreditor, and company standards. He is the author of The U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid Program Integrity Final Regulations (Engage, 2011) and The Road to a National Curriculum: The Legal Aspects of the Common Core Standards, Race to the Top, and Conditional Waivers (Pioneer Institute, Federalist Society, and Pacific Research Institute, 2012). Mr. Eitel holds a J.D. degree from Tulane School of Law (LA) and an A.B. from Georgetown University (DC).

Mr. Robert A. Manzer is Provost and Chief Academic Officer of American Intercontinental University (AIU) an online and ground campus university. In his current role at AIU, Manzer is responsible for curriculum, faculty, accreditation, and student support services. He has served in several administrative positions at liberal arts institutions, including Associate Dean of the Constantin College at the University of Dallas (TX), Dean of the Getty College of Arts and Sciences at Ohio Northern University, and Vice President for Academic Affairs at St. Edward’s University, Austin (TX). In addition to his administrative experience managing academic programming and personnel affairs, Manzer founded the Center for Academic and Career Development at Constantin College, and a Washington DC-based Capitol Hill Internship Program at Nebraska Wesleyan University, supported by a 10-college United Methodist College Washington Consortium. Prior to entering higher education administration, Manzer held an appointment as Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Dallas. Mr. Manzer earned a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago (IL) and B.A. from Carleton College (MN).

Mr. Joseph Knippenberg is Professor of Politics and Director of the Rich Foundation Urban Leadership Program at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta (GA). His teaching and research areas include: history of political philosophy, constitutional law –principally the First Amendment religion clauses, religion and politics, and contemporary liberal theory. Knippenberg has published extensively and his essays and reviews have appeared in a variety of venues, including edited collections, scholarly journals, the Weekly Standard, the Claremont Review of Books, The City: A Journal of Christian Thought, and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He is a contributing scholar to the Georgia Center for Opportunity. Currently he is working on and writing about issues in higher education including a series of commentaries addressing topics such as accreditation and religious colleges, and higher education and social mobility, which have appeared in First Things (online). Knippenberg is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, Phi Beta Kappa, and Omicron Delta Kappa, and sits on the Georgia Advisory Committee of the U.S. Commission of Civil Rights. Mr. Knippenberg earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in Politics from the University of Toronto and a B.A. degree from the James Madison College at Michigan State University.

The American Academy for Liberal Education (AALE) has renewed its membership in the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) International Quality Group (CIQG). Formed in September 2012, CIQG provides a forum for colleges and universities, accrediting organizations and higher education associations, businesses, governments, foundations and individuals to reflect on and exchange ideas concerning major issues relating to quality assurance in an international setting. Membership in CIQG reflects AALE’s commitment to its international members to remain current on topics particularly relevant to quality assurance of post-secondary general education within the international community.

As a CIQG member, AALE receives policy briefs and newsletters throughout the year which provide information on topics such as: public accountability, student learning, new modes of education delivery, international quality expectation, the role of government, academic freedom, non-institutional education and a single set of quality standards. An annual meeting, held during the CHEA Annual Conference in Washington, DC focuses on a current issue of relevance to all members. The topic chosen for this year’s annual meeting held January 27, 2015 was, Quality Assurance: Whose Responsibility?

Further information about CIQG is available at http://www.cheainternational.org