The transition from adolescence to adulthood is focus of inaugural Kessler-Freedheim Lecture on March 7
As the Schubert Center for Child Studies prepares to celebrate its 20th anniversary, a new lecture series honoring two seminal figures in its history is set to launch with a discussion of how childhood and adolescence influence the entrance into adulthood.
Richard Settersten, director of Hallie E. Ford Center for Healthy Children & Families at Oregon State University
In fact, the first Kessler-Freedheim Lecture, at 4:30 p.m. March 7 at the Tinkham Veale University Center, will be presented by one of the center’s former directors, Richard Settersten Jr., author of Not Quite Adults: Why 20-Somethings Are Choosing a Slower Path to Adulthood, and Why It’s Good for Everyone, among several others.
In his talk, Settersten will focus on what the latest science says about how young people build adult identities, and how this process has undergone recent rapid, dramatic changes.
The lecture is free and open to the public and will include light refreshments. Registration is recommended.
Jill Korbin, director of the Schubert Center
“While Dr. Settersten’s work always has had an eye toward understanding the whole of the human life, his focus on adolescence and emerging adulthood help us understand how key these stages are in any person’s development,” said Schubert Center Director Jill Korbin.
The Schubert Center is a coalition of Case Western Reserve faculty who seek to connect research on the well-being of young people to practices, policies and education.
The life transition of the Schubert Center
While the Schubert Center itself is hitting a milestone of adulthood, turning 20 later this year, its roots at the university actually go back to the 1959 founding of its precursor, the Mental Development Center.
By evaluating and treating children with mental disabilities and developmental problems, the center was the first of its kind in the country based at a university.
The new lecture series is co-named for Jane Kessler, a retired psychology professor who founded and first directed the Mental Development Center.
One of its first staff members was lecture co-namesake Donald Freedheim, an emeritus professor of psychology who eventually became first director of the Schubert Center.
Both Kessler and Freedheim will attend the March 7 lecture and remain important voices on human development issues, Korbin said.
“The series helps us recognize the storied history of child welfare research and work on our campus,” said Korbin, the Lucy Adams Leffingwell Professor of Anthropology and an associate dean in the College of Arts and Sciences.
In 1997—a few years after the Mental Development Center left the university—the Schubert Center was established.
In the early 2000s, Schubert Center co-directors, Korbin and Settersten—then a sociology professor at CWRU—steered the center’s mission toward serving as a bridge between research and public policy.
Now, the center has more than 80 faculty associates in each of the university’s eight units. In April 2018, the center will mark its first two decades with an all-day symposium in Cleveland.
“The glue that holds us all together is an interest in child well-being,” said Korbin, who assumed full directorship in 2006 after Settersten left to join the faculty at Oregon State University, where he still serves. “There is always more to learn and teach about improving the lives of children here and around the world.”
