Common Reading Program
The Common Reading Program at Susquehanna University is an effort to create a shared intellectual point of engagement for first-year students. These students are asked to read a common text that will then be used in a variety of ways during their first semester on campus in the fall, including during Welcome Week. The overall goal is to introduce students to life in a community of learners where we are all engaged in discussion and reflection on texts and ideas.
Faculty and staff also read the common reading and find a myriad of ways to use it to engage first-year students. In the classroom, in the residence halls, in administrative offices, over lunch, and in the gym, they engage students and each other in what are hoped to be lively conversations that challenge all to think critically about this text.
2010 Common Reading
This year the university has assembled a collection of readings related to the yearlong University Theme “A Sustainable Future.” Though typically considered an environmental issue, sustainability has much broader relevance. It is "the ability to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." From this perspective, sustainability encompasses not only traditional environmental issues such as resource use, population growth and protection of biodiversity, but also issues of health, food production and consumption, social justice and consumerism. Many of these issues are addressed in the selections included in this anthology.
Members of the Class of 2014 should read this book and complete the related assignment before arriving on campus. There will be opportunities for discussion about this book with peers, orientation team leaders, resident advisors and professors during Welcome Week. The assignment will be collected in the first Perspectives class.
