MFSA's 2024 Conference

Thursday, September 26, 2024

Following on the success of our 2023 conference, MFSA is excited to host our second annual conference in September 2024. This year's conference will be held during the day on Thursday, September 26, 2024. The conference will be held at Cambridge's Le Meridien hotel. We've purposefully scheduled this year's conference to be held on the eve of MIT's Alumni Leadership Conference on September 27-28 to give returning alumni a chance to take part in our programs and get to know MFSA's work. 

As with our 2023 conference, this year's MFSA Conference will feature a variety of panel discussions and lectures on topics concerning free speech and academic freedom, both at MIT and in higher education more generally, including through the national alumni movement of which MFSA is part. We're delighted to host Harvard University professor Steven Pinker as this year's keynote speaker. Professor Pinker, a co-founder of the Council on Academic Freedom at Harvard, has been among academica's foremost faculty leaders in promoting free inquiry in higher education.

Spaces at our conference are limited to roughly 75 attendees, so we encourage those interested in attending to apply with MFSA sooner rather than later. To apply, please fill out the brief form using the button below, or else email MFSA Executive Director Peter Bonilla. 

Apply for MFSA's 2024 Conference

2024 Conference Theme: Turning the Tide at MIT

Last year was a difficult one for higher education, as global events – namely the October 7 terror attack in Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza – unleashed a wave of protests, disruptions, and discontent on campuses nationwide. MIT was no stranger to the controversies of the past year, with disruptive demonstrations and a prolonged encampment testing its principles on free expression. 

In spite of these obstacles and setbacks, however, MFSA hopes we may come to look back at the past year as one in which MIT took important steps to establish itself as a leading light for free expression. President Sally Kornbluth weathered the conflicts of last year better than many of her peers, ultimately acting decisively to enforce MIT’s necessary regulations on time, place, and manner. She charged a new committee, the Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression (CAFCE), to help MIT further cement its commitment to free expression. Finally, President Kornbluth took the bold step of eliminating mandatory DEI statements in faculty hiring. 

There is indeed reason to believe that the tide for free expression may be turning at MIT, and our conference this year aims to showcase the work being done at MIT to instill a stronger culture of free expression – and to encourage MIT not to relent on the progress it has made so far. This year, attendees will hear from MIT Professors Michael Sipser and Annette (Peko) Hosoi, CAFCE’s co-chairs, about the work their committee is doing to help solidify free expression’s future at MIT. We’ll also be hearing from Karl Reid, MIT’s new Vice President of Equity and Inclusion, who will lead a session highlighting MIT’s various efforts at promoting civil discourse across the community. A separate panel of MIT students will provide a necessary perspective on the state of free expression at MIT from those who stand to be most impacted by turbulence in its culture.

Additionally, attendees will hear the insights of other university leaders who are working to further free speech at a cross section of public and private universities. Renowned civil liberties attorney Harvey Silverglate will connect the proceedings with a discussion of the fundamental importance of free speech – even the speech we hate – in a free society, and especially in our institutions of higher education. With Steven Pinker's keynote providing the capstone to this year's conference experience, we hope to continue pushing MIT forward on free expression -- and to enlist more MIT alumni in the cause. 

2024 Conference Speakers

• Michael Sipser, Donner Professor of Mathematics, MIT and Co-Chair, Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression
  
• Anette (Peko) Hosoi, Pappalardo Professor of Mechanical Engineering, MIT and Co-Chair, Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression
  
• Karl W. Reid, Vice President of Equity and Inclusion, MIT
• Harvey Silverglate, civil liberties lawyer and author; co-founder, Foundation for Individual rights and Expression (FIRE)
• Jason Merchant, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs, University of Chicago
• David Reingold, Senior Vice President for Policy Planning and Justin S. Morrill Dean, College of Liberal Arts, Purdue University
• Ramsey White, Secretary, Board of Trustees, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Joseph de Gearo, Assistant Vice President of Student Affairs and Dean of Students, Adelphi University

Keynote Speaker: Steven Pinker

Johnstone Professor of Psychology, Harvard University

Steven Pinker is an experimental psychologist who conducts research in visual cognition, psycholinguistics, and social relations. He grew up in Montreal and earned his BA from McGill University and his PhD from Harvard University. Currently Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, he was previously the Peter de Florez Professor in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT, on whose faculty he served from 1982 to 2003. He has won numerous prizes for his research, his teaching, and his books, including The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, The Blank Slate, The Better Angels of Our Nature, The Sense of Style, and Enlightenment Now. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, a Humanist of the Year, a recipient of nine honorary doctorates, and one of Foreign Policy’s World’s Top 100 Public Intellectuals and Time’s 100 Most Influential People in the World Today. He was Chair of the Usage Panel of the American Heritage Dictionary, and writes frequently for the New York Times, the Guardian, and other publications. His twelfth book, published in 2021, is called Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters.

Conference Location

Le Méridien Boston Cambridge

Conference Details:

Date: Thursday, September 26, 2024

Time: Roughly 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. 

Location: 

Le Méridien Boston Cambridge

20 Sidney St

Cambridge, MA 02139