MEMO
From:   Jim Ralph
Date:    February 20, 2012

Re:      CMRS Professional Development Opportunity

Dear Colleagues,

This is to let you know about a professional development opportunity in the United Kingdom that will be specially funded by the Office of the Dean of the Faculty.

For the past year, Middlebury College has headed a college consortium (including Bates, Smith, Wellesley, Colgate, Carleton and 11 other institutions) that sends American undergraduates to study during their junior year at the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies (CMRS) in Oxford.  CMRS is affiliated with Keble College, Oxford, and contains a small research library as well as seminar rooms and a dormitory.  During the summer months, CMRS offers programs for faculty members and graduate students from the consortium colleges and universities.

This summer, from July 3-7, CMRS will host an interactive seminar on “Rhetoric in the 21st Century.”  It will be co-chaired by James J. Murphy, Professor Emeritus of Rhetoric, University of California, Davis, and Dr. Nicholas Crowe, Senior Dean of CMRS.  The speakers will include Sir Brian Vickers, FBA, Senior Fellow, School of Advanced Study, University of London; Peter Mack, Director, Warburg Institute, and Professor of English, Warwick University; and Professor Jennifer Richards, Head of School and Professor of English, Newcastle University.  The fee for attendance at the seminar is £600 (about $900), which includes daily breakfast and lunch, opening dinner, closing lunch, and accommodation at CMRS.  Details can be found at http://www.cmrs.org.uk/research/rhetoric-in-the-twenty-first-century-summer-2012.

Because of Middlebury’s ties with CMRS, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty will reimburse the £600 fee for any faculty member who wishes to attend the seminar.  This reimbursement will not count against each faculty member’s professional development funds.  Air-fare and other costs of transportation, however, will have to be requested from normal professional development funds.

This would be a good opportunity for you, not only to attend an academic seminar that might be of interest, but also to carry out research in the United Kingdom.  The fact that the Olympic Games begin in London on July 27 may also attract your attention to this offer!

Please note that the number of participants in the seminar is limited to 20, and you will have to apply for a place.  The application form can be found at www.cmrs.org.uk/research/C21stRhetoricApplication.doc.  If you have further questions about the seminar or CMRS, you can address them to Nicholas Crowe at ncrowe@cmrs.org.uk, or to Paul Monod in the History department, who represents Middlebury College on the consortium board.