Dear Supporter of Humanism and Freethought,

Hi!  My name is Lyz Liddell, and I'm the new campus organizer at the Secular Student Alliance.  This spring, I’ve been meeting with Secular Student Alliance affiliates all over the U.S.    I’ve been amazed and delighted by the creativity, enthusiasm, and dedication of the students and leaders I’ve met.  They organize ambitious projects, come up with new ideas, and have the youthful energy to pull it all off.

The Secular Student Alliance has moved into its new office space at 1515 W. Lane Ave. Rm. 101 in Upper Arlington, OH.  We're delighted to be sharing this space with Camp Quest and the Humanist Community of Central Ohio. 

All three organizations are having an open house between 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. on Wednesday, June 17th.  Everyone is welcome!  Come and learn about what SSA, Camp Quest, and HCCO are doing to spread secular values in central Ohio and around the country (and even world).

We're located one block east of the Lane Avenue Mall (which has a stop for the #84 bus).  There is ample parking around the building. 

You can RSVP and share this event with your friends on Facebook. 

Can't make it to our open house?  Come to the Secular Student Alliance conference August 7-9 on the campus of Ohio State University.

"Part of what is giving the movement momentum is the proliferation of groups on college campuses. The Secular Student Alliance now has 146 chapters, up from 42 in 2003" wrote Laurie Goodstein in the New York Times on April 26th, 2009.

We're actually growing so fast that we're up to 150 affiliate groups now (they interviewed us last week).

The SSA does not charge any of our campus affiliates for the services we offer.  So more groups doesn't mean we have more resources to support those groups. Individuals like you support the Secular Student Alliance and make it possible for us to  help mobilize these campus leaders (of course, they do a lot of  mobilizing on their own, too).  We cannot do this without the help of our donors.  Become one today!  We are a 501(c)(3) educational non-profit and your contributions are fully tax deductible.  You say you don't want to join?  Well, you could also just ChipIn! Thanks!

Bravo to the Pastafarians of the U of South Carolina and Andrew Cederdahl for their shout out in the story as well!

Want to get involved?  Check to see if there is an SSA Affiliate Group near you.  You can look to see if someone on your campus is working to start a group.  You can also request a Group Starting Packet if there isn't a group in your area and you'd like to get one going.

 

The Secular Student Alliance (www.secularstudents.org) is seeking two college interns for the summer of 2009. 

• Internship Details
• Task Focus Areas
• How To Apply
  
  

Internship Details
* These positions are ten weeks long and have a $200/week stipend. 
* The start and stop dates are flexible, as are breaks, we only require a commitment of approximately ten weeks between mid June and late September. 
* These positions are 40 hr./week positions and will take place during normal business hours except where otherwise noted. 
* We are willing to be flexible in terms of time and stipend to meet academic requirements.
* The interns will work at our office in Columbus, OH.
* On a case-by-case basis, some work may be able to be done via telecommuting.
* Business casual dress is required.

Our mission is to organize, unite, educate, and serve students and student communities that promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human based ethics. The bulk of our efforts go into organizing and supporting students and student groups who do not see theism as the source of morality or knowledge--this includes atheists, agnostics, humanists, rationalists and other non-theists.  We have over 130 affiliates in nine countries--the vast majority of our affiliates are in the U.S.

The Secular Student Alliance is a 501(c)(3) educational, non-profit, public charity.  We were founded in 2000 by students and recent students.  We are headquartered in Columbus, OH.

Secular Student eMpirical February 11, 2009

• Introduction
• Getting People to Come to Your Meetings
  
• University of Northern Iowa Celebrates Charles Darwin
  
• "Does God Exist?" - Hitchens v. Turek at Virginia Commonwealth University
• FFRF Challenges Religious Holiday Displays in Illinois Government
• New Speaker on Bureau: Dr. James Coors
  
• Share Your Thoughts: Survey on the "New Atheism"
• Get Starting Planning a Spring Break Service Trip
• Speaker Event Planning Checklist
  
  Save yourself some clicking and read the all-on-one-page version of this month's eMpirical.
  

Recently, the SSA's Board of Directors revised our by-laws to make a significant change.  A full copy of the new bylaws can be viewed on our website.

In previous years, we have held elections for new board members in February.  While we have had outstanding people run in the elections, we have found this date to be especially inconvenient for current students, who are often preoccupied with exams and classes to give 100% of themselves to fulfilling the responsibilities of being a board member if elected.

To address this problem, the current board has voted to change the date of our elections -- to May instead of February.  By doing this, we hope to see more current student leaders running for positions on our board.  Ideally, they've just finished another year of running their SSA affiliate group and are finished with their school year.  Since the board has an in-person meeting in the summer, we also hope to harness the energy of new board members very soon after they've been elected.  (Previously, there was a gap of several months between being elected and attending that in-person meeting.)

The Secular Student Alliance (SSA) is proud to announce that Greg M. Epstein, the Humanist Chaplain of Harvard University, has been named Chair of the SSA Academic Advisory Board, joining such renowned nonbelievers as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Wendy Kaminer, and Michael Shermer.  Mr. Epstein will be creating a stronger connection between the growing secular student movement and leaders in the academic world in general, and members of the SSA's Academic Advisory Board in particular.

Mr. Epstein was the primary organizer of "The New Humanism," an international conference in honor of the 30th anniversary of the Humanist Chaplaincy of Harvard University. The 2007 event at Harvard drew one of the largest and most diverse audiences of any Humanist gathering in North American history. Mr. Epstein blogs for Newsweek magazine and The Washington Post, and his work as a Humanist Rabbi and Chaplain has been featured by National Public Radio, BBC Radio, Newsweek, The Boston Globe, The Jewish Daily Forward, and other outlets. He is an adviser to two student groups at Harvard College, the Secular Society and the Interfaith Council, and to the Harvard Humanist Graduate Community.  His first book, Good Without God, for William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, will be released later this year.

In 2005 Mr. Epstein received ordination as a Humanist Rabbi from the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism, where he studied in Jerusalem and Michigan for five years. Humanistic Judaism is a movement within Judaism that emphasizes Jewish culture and history rather than belief in a supreme being as the sources of Jewish identity. He holds a BA (Religion and Chinese) and an MA (Judaic Studies) from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and a Master of Theological Studies from the Harvard Divinity School.

August E. Brunsman IV, executive director of the Secular Student Alliance said, "I have every confidence that Mr. Epstein will help us engage some of the world's brightest minds in the task of sharing with today's students just how good life without a god can be."

The Secular Student Alliance is a national nonprofit organization that supports a network of over 130 groups on high school and college campuses. These groups create safe spaces for student nonbelievers and promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human based ethics.

Mr. Epstein said, "I'm delighted to work with the SSA because I share their vision for a Secular and nontheistic youth movement so powerful and well-organized that one day one of the millions of young American  "nonbelievers" President Obama acknowledged at his inaugural will her or himself be inaugurated President, as a believer in Humanism."

by Lyz Liddell

On December 2, 2008, the Springfield Nativity Scene Committee, led by Dan Zanoza, erected a Christian nativity scene in the rotunda of the Illinois State Capitol building.  The group’s stated intent is to show others that religious displays shouldn't be banned from public buildings.  The project is privately funded and has the appropriate permits from the Secretary of State’s office.
The manner in which they put it up, of course, is not the issue.  

Hemant Mehta Chair, Board of Directors

August E. Brunsman IV Executive Director

Lyz Liddell Senior Campus Organizer

Nov. 19, 2008 - The past year has been phenomenally successful for the Secular Student Alliance.  Most notably, our affiliate count has gone up by over 40%.  This report details our 2008 activities, from campus group affiliate support and a great conference to our electronic newsletter and summer internships.

 Direct Campus Group Affiliate Support

We presently have 129* campus affiliate groups in twelve countries. This time last year we had 90; at this time in 2006 we had only 65.  Our affiliates range in size from just a handful of students to groups like the Campus Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists (CASH) at the University of Minnesota, who obtain thousands of dollars a year from their student activities board, and have organized their own conferences. Regardless of size or resources, each group receives individual attention from our staff. Providing these services is the core of our work.

Affiliate Tracking and Listing

We ask all of our affiliates to update their contact information with us twice a year.  Because we do this, we are able to publish the most up-to-date list of active humanist/atheist student groups of which we are aware .  This helps campus groups connect with each other and makes them more accessible to off-campus groups in the movement and the media.

Campus Organizers

We have a full time Senior Campus Organizer (SCO), Lyz Liddell, who coordinates the delivery of services, develops new services, advises campus leaders and helps them troubleshoot problems, and maintains our relationships with our affiliates.

Our SCO also supervises our Campus Organizing Interns. These are temporary positions filled by students who work ten hours a week supporting and starting groups in their geographic region.  This spring we had Campus Organizing Interns in Northern California, Southern California, and New York City.

Media Assistance

With a subscription to Bacon’s Media Database (courtesy of the American Humanist Association) and technical assistance from the Institute for Humanist Studies’ Communications Director Duncan Crary, the Secular Student Alliance is able to send out press releases for campus events to local media markets. Over a dozen media mentions about SSA campus affiliate groups resulted—many of which we republished on our website (with permission).

Additionally, the Secular Student Alliance itself was covered in the following stories this academic year:

Atheism services on the rise at colleges – 9/21/07
The Daily Free Press – Boston, MA

Faithlessness on the rise? - 11/7/07
Brown Daily Herald – Providence, RI

Cake and controversy for Darwin's birthday – 2/12/08
Brown Daily Herald – Providence, RI

Losing Faith in Modern America – 5/7/08
New Zealand Herald – Auckland, New Zealand