The Life Worth Living (LWL) faculty network foregrounds the most important question of our lives: What is a life worth living? Designed to remedy a lack of personal, authentic engagement with questions of meaning in higher ed, the LWL approach equips students, educators, and the public for the lifelong process of discerning, articulating, and pursuing flourishing life. Students and teachers consider the breadth of human experience by engaging philosophical and religious traditions that answer our most profound existential questions. Students and educators are invited to articulate and live their own answers to these fundamental questions.
The network strives to create a world where deep reflection on the shape of flourishing life is central to pluralistic undergraduate education and public discourse. Central to this work is helping students develop the skills to pursue respectful, truth-seeking conversation across enduring lines of difference. To date, the LWL approach has reached over 1600 undergraduates. The project team, composed of key instructors from the existing network, seeks to broaden this impact by bringing more educators into the network. Educators trained in the LWL approach will be able to develop courses attuned to their particular campus cultures, curricula, and needs.
To accelerate the growth of the network, the project team will support course development and teacher formation through sub-granting and training programs. For instructors already familiar with the LWL approach, the project team will support program growth via the development of “hubs”: centers of excellence that will promote the approach, recruit new educators to adopt it, and explore ways to expand its influence. This growing network will be supported by robust digital media offerings and shared assessment protocols. Ultimately, the program seeks to center vibrant, critical discussion of what makes life meaningful at universities and in the broader culture.
