1. Encountering Higher Education’s Last Broad Stroke of Inclusion: Supporting Religious, Secular, and Spiritual Identities

2. Founder and Executive Director Convergence on Campus
J. Cody Nielsen
Founder and Executive Director
Convergence on Campus
Welcome & Introductions

3. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...”
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4. Education as Transformation
1998, Wellesley participants
Jon Dalton
Astins
Parker Palmer
18 college & university presidents
1200 articles in a survey of six major journals since 1998.

5. Foundations of Research
UCLA Study of Spirituality and Higher Education
Retention
Graduation Rates
Civic Engagement
Student Satisfaction
IDEALS (Interfaith Diversity and Experiences & Attitudes Longitudinal Study)

6. The Primer
University of Minnesota- 2011
Research
150 Institutions

7. The 4 Pillar Approach

8. Enhancing Institutional Climates to support the religious, secular, and spiritual identities through policy and practice

9. that are long-standing and have attracted large numbers of adherents,
Religious
People whose understanding of reality is influenced by a particular religious
tradition are considered to be religious. There are several religious traditions
that are long-standing and have attracted large numbers of adherents,
and there is also a wide variety of smaller, more recent religious affiliations
that have just as significant an influence on those who identify with them.

10. Secular
We use “secular” here in contrast with “sacred.” The secular viewpoint
involves those people who feel that there is either no such thing as
spiritual reality, or god(s), or who just don’t feel certain whether or
not these things exist.

11. Spiritual
This category includes people whose understanding of spiritual reality is not defined by a single or, in many cases, any religious tradition, but is rather generated by a sense of direct connection to something sacred or greater than oneself. That sense is often described as an inner experience rather than an outward observation.

12. Conclusions
“The job of colleges and universities is to articulate, examine, and judge whether any particular idea is worthy of being called knowledge”
Making space for religion-….signals that academic conversation is open to consideration of all the many other factors that influence the framing of knowledge. Conversely, if religion is avoided or ignored, it signals that limits are being places in advance on what will be deemed to be academically respectable.
Small. J. (Eds.). (2015). Making Meaning: Embracing Spirituality, Faith, Religion, and Life Purpose in Student Affairs. Sterling, VA. Stylus.