Leading What Endures: Equity, Belonging, and the Future We Shape, the Vice President’s Speaker Series, creates a timely forum for examining the social, cultural, legal, political, and technological forces reshaping our communities and institutions—and how leaders can respond with clarity, courage, and care. 

Facilitated by the Vice President for Inclusive Excellence, the series will convene distinguished leaders, scholars, practitioners, advocates, and emerging voices whose personal commitments and professional expertise have enabled them to continue advancing equity and belonging despite sustained resistance, shifting policy landscapes, and institutional uncertainty. Open to the American University community and friends of AU, each session will pair candid dialogue and lived experience with research-informed, field-tested strategies, revealing the choices, practices, and sources of resolve that help individuals and institutions sustain progress. 

Programming will address timely societal issues and their implications for higher education and public life, including artificial intelligence and algorithmic decision-making; educational access and opportunity; institutional trust; free expression, civil discourse, and democratic participation; disability access; mental health and well-being; identity, belonging, and polarization; economic mobility; and leadership amid changing laws, policies, and public expectations. Across these topics, the goal is to equip audiences with informed perspectives and adaptable tools to navigate resistance, communicate with purpose, build coalitions, and advance meaningful change within their own spheres of influence. 

More than a lecture series, Leading What Endures will show how committed leaders translate conviction into sustained action. By sharing strategies shaped through personal experience and professional practice, speakers will help audiences anticipate emerging challenges and identify concrete approaches for carrying the work of equity and belonging forward—even when conditions are difficult.