February 20, 2006
Director of Media Relations
413/542-8417
AMHERST, Mass.—Rushworth M. Kidder ’65, founder and president of the Institute for Global Ethics, will deliver a lecture titled “Moral Courage: The Fortitude to Make Difficult Decisions and the Integrity to Carry Them Out” at 4:30 p.m. on Monday, March 6, in Johnson Chapel at Amherst College. Sponsored by the Schwemm Fund, Kidder’s talk is free and open to the public.
Kidder graduated with honors from Amherst College in 1965 and earned his Ph.D. degree in English and comparative literature from Columbia University in 1969. Highly respected for his studies in corporate and global ethics, Kidder has focused most recently on providing the appropriate mental tools for tough moral decision-making. Prior to founding the Institute for Global Ethics in 1990, Kidder taught English literature for 10 years at Wichita State University and worked as a highly acclaimed senior columnist for the Christian Science Monitor. He is a trustee of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and a fellow of the George H. Gallup International Institute. Among many positions on ethical committees across the nation, Kidder serves on the advisory council of the Character Education Partnership, the advisory board of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University and the advisory board of “Religion & Ethics Newsweekly” on public television.
Kidder is an award-winning author of many of books, including Moral Courage (2006), How Good People Make Tough Choices: Resolving the Dilemma of Ethical Living (1996)and Reinventing the Future: Global Goals for the 21st Century (1989). He also serves as executive editor for Ethics Newsline, the first Internet-based ethics information service, for which he writes a weekly column.
###