Lee Shulman, Ducommun Professor of Education, Emeritus at Stanford, reflects on his life and academic career, describing the chance-filled path he took from slicing pastrami in his parents’ deli to teaching at Michigan State and Stanford and then presiding over the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. He talks about his Yeshiva high school in Chicago, undergraduate and PhD experiences at the University of Chicago, his research interests in the philosophy and psychology of education, integration of pedagogy with content, development of new forms of teaching assessment, and his work at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching which moved to the Stanford campus. He comments that just as pastrami is marbled, teaching and research should be equal parts of a well-marbled career.

Stanford Emeriti Council Autobiographical Reflections

Lee Shulman: A Well-Marbled Career

In a lecture on Nov. 20, 2019, entitled “A Fortunate Life,” David Abernethy, Stanford Professor of Political Science, Emeritus reflects on the advantages of being born into an American, white, middle class, Protestant family. His youthful commitment to doing something about sub-Saharan Africa led to summer experiences in Nigeria and Guinea with Operation Crossroads Africa and eventually to filling a new faculty billet at Stanford in African politics. He discusses changes at Stanford since he arrived in 1965, including the increased diversity of the student body and trends in student activism; his support for replacing the freshman Western Culture requirement with more globally oriented courses; involvement in campus anti-apartheid and disinvestment issues; and his role in the controversy over the location in the campus foothills of the proposed Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. He describes his post-retirement desire to balance activities that are familiar vs. unfamiliar and benefitting himself vs. others. New activities include singing in the Stanford Symphonic Chorus and chairing the Emeriti Council. He advises that it is okay in retirement to step back from our hectic lives. He also answers audience questions about his book, “The Dynamics of Global Dominance: European Overseas Empires, 1415-1980,” published in 2000. 

David Abernethy: A Fortunate Life

Albert Camarillo, Stanford Professor emeritus of History, reflects on growing up as a Mexican American in the Los Angeles suburb of Compton and the profound effect of that environment and the opportunities it provided in shaping his scholarship and his life. He discusses racial restrictive covenants, changing demographics, school integration in the 1960s, and the value of playing team sports. As one of very few Mexican American students when he entered UCLA, he met his wife Susan and discovered the nascent field of Chicano history, going on to earn the first PhD in this field. Coming to Stanford in 1975 as an affirmative action hire, he praises senior faculty mentors in the history department. After founding Stanford’s Center for Chicano Research, he directed the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity and credits Stanford for taking a chance and investing in the development of this new field. He mentions chairing a major two-year study, the University Commission on Minority Issues. And he notes that his service as associate dean of Humanities & Sciences helped him learn how the university works from the inside.

Albert Camarillo: Growing Up Mexican American

How does a Jewish high school student from Great Falls, Montana with "B" grades become a world-renowned scientist and founding director of Stanford's Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine? In these autobiographical reflections, Irv Weissman, Professor of Pathology and of Developmental Biology, describes his journey to Stanford Medical School and his decision to make medical research his life-long priority. He discusses his laboratory's work on blood-forming stem cells with the ability to cure some cancers, his experience and advice concerning formation of biotech companies in order to ensure that promising therapies reach patients in need , and his role in writing California Proposition 71 in 2004 that established the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine.

Irv Weissman: Autobiographical Reflections

Professor Emeritus Ewart Thomas reflected on his growing-up years in Guyana, his education at University of the West Indies and Cambridge University, and decision to join Stanford's Psychology Department. He focussed on the key role friends and colleagues played throughout his life, encouraging him to perform at his best and to take leadership roles as department chair and as Dean of Humanities and Sciences.

Ewart Thomas: Autobiographical Reflections

Channing Robertson, Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering, explained how advisers from high school through graduate school urged him to move to the next educational level, enabling a once-unthinkable career in academia to become a reality. He discussed the opportunities Stanford presented to work closely with researchers in several scientific disciplines, achieving results a specialist in only one field could not attain. He also described being an expert witness in important trials against pharmaceutical and tobacco companies.

Channing Robertson: A Journey Through Uncharted Waters

Determined to oppose the habit of self-importance almost endemic to an autobiographical talk, Bill Chace instead discussed his life with irony, eloquence, and humor. A professor of literature who valued his teaching, he discovered he also liked administration and put to good use—as president of Wesleyan and Emory Universities—his observations during two decades at Stanford. He believes that leadership at a university must be fundamentally truth-telling.

William Chace Autobiographical Reflections

Reflecting on his Stanford years and a long career of public service, David A. Hamburg, M.D., former professor and chair of psychiatry at Stanford, spoke about the establishment of his chimpanzee research in Tanzania, the kidnapping (and release) of 4 students, and coming face to face with problems of poverty, disease and revolution. He also discussed his time as head of the Institute of Medicine, National Academy of Sciences, President of Carnegie Corporation, and co-chair of Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict. He worked with several US presidents on issues including national health policy, war and peace, nuclear disarmament and preventing mass violence.

David Hamburg: Stanford as Impetus for an Unexpected, Gratifying, Long Career

Jim Sheehan, Stanford Professor of History, Emeritus, describes the two ways in which he has lived in history: as a historian who studies the past, while at the same time living in a present that will become a part of history. He reflects on his Irish Catholic upbringing in San Francisco, Stanford undergraduate years in the 1950s, and doctorate in German history at UC Berkeley. He discusses his career academic focus on Germany within the broader context of European history.

James Sheehan, "Living in History"

Paul Berg, Stanford Professor of Cancer Research Emeritus and 1980 winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, spoke about: his arrival at Stanford in 1959, along with six colleagues from Washington Univ. in St. Louis, who created the open, sharing environment of the new Biochemistry Department; research on genetic processes and a search to understand cancer; work developing novel tools for manipulating DNA; and his role in organizing the important, public Asilomar Conference on Recombinant DNA in 1975 where scientists evaluated risks and policy issues and agreed to voluntary limitations and guidelines.

Paul Berg: Science & the Polity, a Fragile Interface

Alain Enthoven, Professor of Public and Private Management, Emeritus in the Graduate School of Business reflects on his life and career. He discusses his contributions to a fundamental change in national and NATO defense strategy that reduced dependence on nuclear weapons and describes his contributions to the transformation of American health care finance.

Alain Enthoven: Right Places at the Right Time

Donald Knuth, Professor of the Art of Computer Programming, describes how his own experiences as a young student inspired him to become a professor. He speaks about the privilege of connecting with the best students and being part of the world's leading department of Computer Science when that subject was just beginning to take shape. Knuth talks about contributing to a revolution in the printing industry by making computers do new tricks, mentions some of his over 30 books and many papers, as well as his love of music and composing.

Donald Knuth: Theory, Practice and Fun

Walter Vincenti, Professor Emeritus of Aeronautics & Astronautics, reminisces about undergraduate student life at Stanford in the 1930s.

Walter Vincenti: Autobiographical Reflections

Helen Quinn, Professor Emerita of Particle Physics and Astrophysics at SLAC, speaks about her life and career, lack of early recognition as a woman in physics, and recent extensive involvement in K-12 science education.

Helen Quinn: Autobiographical Reflections

In the "Autobiographical Reflections" series, Mike Kirst, Professor Emeritus in the Graduate School of Business, talks about his career in the federal government prior to Stanford, and his current role as president of the California State Board of Education (for the 2nd time) and advisor to Governor Jerry Brown.

Michael Kirst: Accidental Professor

The Stanford Emeriti Council Autobiographical Reflections is a lecture series in which retired professors talk about their lives, careers, post-retirement experiences and revelations.

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Lee Shulman: A Well-Marbled Career

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