This weekend Vassar unveiled The Vassar Institute for the Liberal Arts, a new space created to serve as a hub for policy, learning, debate, and ideas on the issues that affect us today and will shape our lives decades from now. The opening brought together a news-making gathering of leaders from education, media, government, business, tech, art and design, and demonstrated the significance of liberal arts learning in preparing young adults to conceptualize new ideas and overcome the challenges of the future.

Vassar President Elizabeth H. Bradley views the launch of the Vassar Institute as the next step in the College’s vision for promoting dialogue about important issues of the day and coming together to collaborate and learn with the larger community. “The Institute for the Liberal Arts will embody this vision; it is a convening place, a set of programs and events, and a gathering spot for the incubation of new ideas and for serendipitous conversations,” she said.

The new Vassar Institute, housed in a green building designed by award-winning architect Frederick Fisher, will convene scholars, thought leaders, and community members from Vassar and beyond. The Vassar Institute program creators will host a variety of events to foster debate and innovative ideas that address contemporary challenges. The Institute will showcase the power of a liberal arts education with rich conversations and collaboration on pressing local, national and global issues, and cultivation of a robust intellectual ecosystem. Faculty and partners will work together on significant topics including environmentalism, educational justice, and how the liberal arts can help mobilize entrepreneurship.

The launch weekend showcased the innovative spirit of the Vassar Institute, highlighted by a series of prominent keynote speakers. Notable participants included Dr. Jim Yong Kim, chancellor of the University of Global Health Equity and former president of Dartmouth College and the World Bank, who talked with Institute Program Director Wesley Dixon about the role of the liberal arts in an increasingly polarized world. Other key discussions included a conversation led by New York Times journalist Steve Lohr with Maria Flynn, President and CEO of Jobs for the Future, and Aneesh Raman, LinkedIn’s Chief Economic Opportunity Officer, which focused on the future of work and the significance of a humanistic liberal arts education in the era of Artificial Intelligence.

A panel discussion led by Vassar Professor of Art Yvonne Elet brought together experts, including Fisher, who explored how the Vassar Institute can facilitate effective dialogues that promote health and sustainability within communities. A group of diverse and distinguished Vassar alumni and board members attended and engaged in these significant conversations.

The new building also includes a hotel–The Heartwood at Vassar, a 50-room, 48,000 square foot hotel–and a restaurant called The Salt Line Hudson Valley. The Vassar Institute for the Liberal Arts will also include space for Vassar’s Conversations at the Salt Line, a podcast, hosted by Institute Program Director Wesley Dixon.

About Vassar

Founded in 1861 and based in Poughkeepsie, Vassar is renowned for pioneering achievements in education, for its long history of curricular innovation, and for the beauty of its campus, just 85 miles north of New York City. Originally founded to provide women an education equal to that once available only to men, Vassar became coeducational in 1969.