Programs for Mar 1-31

 March 3, Thursday Luncheon Roundtable – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Speaker is Innmate Marc Kittner. His topic—Antarctica and the Atacama Desert: Through the Lens

Marc and wife Ashley Hulsey recently traveled to Antarctica and Chile’s Atacama Desert, adding two more destinations to a long list of places they have visited. Marc, an accomplished photographer, will show us a selection of pictures from the trip and tell us about his experiences.

Marc retired in 2018 from a legal career as litigator, corporate counsel, and family law attorney when he and Ashley moved to Philadelphia from Washington state. He is now a fine art photographer with special interest in botanical specimens. His botanical photographs focus on features that we are likely to overlook, at times getting so close to a flower that his lens seems to be inside it, recording its contours and rendering it as a landscape. His portfolio also contains many “destination” photographs of landscapes, scenes, and people—not a surprise, considering his love of travel. (You can see his work here: https://www.kittnerphotography.com/) His photographs have been selected for a dozen juried exhibitions and are in numerous private collections around the country.

Video:To see a recording of this presentation, click on Play Event. Click on the play button at the bottom left of the screen that comes up to see the presentation. Put your computer into full screen mode to get the best image.

March 7, Monday Quarterback Luncheon – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Alan Penziner is our Quarterback.

March 10, Thursday Luncheon Roundtable – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Speakers are Bill Marimow and Dan Rottenberg. Their topic— A More Perfect Union: The Inquirer Examines Founding Ideals and Institutional Realities, Starting with Itself. They will discuss the first installment of the Inquirer’s special project “examining the roots of systemic racism through institutions founded in Philadelphia.”

Bill Marimow, a Philadelphia native who was born just a few blocks away at Pennsylvania Hospital, was the editor in chief of The Philadelphia Inquirer and Baltimore Sun; he was also Vice President of news at National Public Radio. As an Inquirer staff writer, Bill received Pulitzer Prizes in 1978 and 1985, and his work on the bombing of the MOVE house was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1986. Bill currently serves as the president of the Fund for Investigative Journalism, and he is a senior adviser to Brian Communications. His daughter Ann is a Washington Post reporter, and his son Scott is the managing director of a private equity fund, Providence Equity Partners. His wife Diane is a sculptress and art educator.

Innmate Dan Rottenberg, author of a just-published professional memoir, Education of a Journalist, has been chief editor of seven innovative publications, most recently Broad Street Review, the online arts and culture salon he created in 2005. As an advocate for free expression and alternative media, he successfully defended seven libel suits and received Temple University’s Free Speech Award in 1992. His twelve published books include Finding Our Fathers (Random House, 1977), which launched the modern Jewish genealogy movement, and Death of a Gunfighter (Westholme Publishing, 2008), which was honored as Best Western History Book of 2008 by the Wild West History Association. He served as a consultant in 1981 when Forbes magazine launched its annual “Forbes 400” list of wealthiest Americans. His syndicated film commentaries appeared in monthly city magazines around the U.S. from 1971 to 1983. Earlier, he was a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. executive editor of Philadelphia magazine, managing editor of Chicago Journalism Review, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, and editor of a daily newspaper in Indiana.

Video:To see a recording of this presentation, click on Play Event. Click on the play button at the bottom left of the screen that comes up to see the presentation. Put your computer into full screen mode to get the best image.

March 14, Monday Quarterback Luncheon – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Tom Tropp is our Quarterback.

March 18, Friday Club Dinner, starting with cocktails at 5:30 p.m.

Speaker is Fergus Carey. His topic—St. Patrick and James Joyce’s Ulysses.

March 21, Monday Quarterback Luncheon – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Ruth Morelli is our Quarterback.

March 24, Thursday Luncheon Roundtable – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Speaker is Cyndi Reed Rickards, Director of Justice Studies at Drexel. Her topic—Bridging the Big Divides: Inside Out, Side by Side

Our discussions of “big divides” at the Club, such as social and economic inequality and disparities in criminal justice, typically acknowledge the big problems of bridging those divides. We recognize that younger generations see things through different lenses than ours, and also that they face hard challenges in knowing and navigating current social, economic, and political landscapes. Cyndi provides Drexel students the chance to develop knowledge and navigation skills through courses that place them side by side with incarcerated students and community members that they might not encounter otherwise.

As Associate Teaching Professor and Director of Justice Studies, Cyndi Rickards teaches community-based learning courses in Drexel’s Department of Criminology and Justice Studies. She regularly teaches courses within the Philadelphia prison system and brings together Drexel students and incarcerated students for an Inside-Out course. Cyndi received her Ed.D. degree from Drexel, and her graduate research explored racial disparities in patterns of drug use in urban juvenile populations. More recently, her research has examined the development of 21st-century skills through community-based learning courses.

Video:To see a recording of this presentation, click on Play Event. Click on the play button at the bottom left of the screen that comes up to see the presentation. Put your computer into full screen mode to get the best image.

March 28, Monday Quarterback Luncheon – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Alina Macneal is our Quarterback.

March 31, Thursday Luncheon Roundtable – 12:30 to 1:45 p.m.

Speaker is labor lawyer Jessica Caggiano, a partner at Willig, Williams and Davidson in Philadelphia. Her topic—“Wage Equity: Women’s Economic Rights in the Workplace.”

On this final day of Women’s History Month, Jessica Caggiano brings her experience in advocating for worker’s rights to a discussion of economic parity, the effect of laws intended to promote and protect wage equity and the factors that perpetuate wage disparity. She will touch on common challenges faced by workers in the private and public sectors, and on recent attention-grabbing examples such as the United States Women’s National Soccer Team equal pay lawsuit, the National Women’s Soccer League Players Association (NWSLPA) fight for better pay, and wage disparity issues raised by the United States Women’s National Hockey Team.

Jessica was part of Willig, Williams and Davidson’s three-person team that negotiated the first-ever collective bargaining agreement for the NWSPLA, which was approved in January. She has received accolades for her work as advisor and advocate for unions and the workers they represent—in contract negotiations and bargaining, in the grievance and arbitration process, and in labor litigation. Her clients include unions representing both private- and public-sector workers. Previously, she was in-house counsel at the New York State Public Employees Federation and an Associate Staff Counsel at the Pennsylvania State Education Association. In her private life, she is a member of the Lady Patriots Ice Hockey Organization, based in Bucks County (also an active player) and an avid runner who has completed the Boston Marathon.