Two years ago, President George W. Bush mandated that all educational institutions take a day to celebrate the signing of the Constitution. On Nov. 2, Cal Poly will observe this day as the university will hold the second annual “Constitution Day,” in the Spanos Theater from 3:30 to 4:40 p.m.
“Americans are united by the principles embodied in the United States Constitution,” Bush said on the White House’s Web site www.whitehouse.gov. “On Constitution Day … we celebrate the establishment of the United States Constitution and honor the Framers of this groundbreaking document.”
The office of the dean for the College of Liberal Arts began planning for the event last spring, but since Cal Poly’s fall quarter did not begin until after Sept. 17, the event had to be pushed back a bit, CLA associate dean Debra Valencia-Laver said.
This year’s head speaker will be Kevin D. Brown, a law professor at Indiana University.
“He has outstanding credentials and has done a lot of research in this area,” Valencia-Laver said. “He’s written on this and talked on this quite a bit. We’re very grateful and very honored to have him.”
Brown is a legal expert on the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case, which will be his topic for the event titled “The Re-Examination of Brown v. Board of Education from the Perspective of the Post-Desegregation Era.”
He has written several articles on the convergence of law, education and race theory in hopes of bridging the gap between majority and minority groups in American culture.
Last year about 200 people attended “Constitution Day,” Laver said. “We’re again hoping for a large crowd.”
The free event is open to anyone and in sponsored by the Provost office, the CLA dean’s office and the history and political science departments. For more information call the CLA dean’s office at 756-2706.