Since all of you currently on the mailing list have already re-added yourselves on our club page, you should know that the SGA has completely overhauled and rebuilt Ramsconnect. This is good, in a way, because the old Ramsconnect was very unpredictable and the new site has a lot of new features. However, this also means that all of our old information was wiped, including our mailing list. This happened without any warning to club officers. Because of this, there's many old members of the club who are expecting an email about the first meeting from me and haven't gotten it. If you're in contact with any members from last semester, please ask them to come to one of the meetings planned for next week so I can get them oriented with the new system, or direct them to the new club website. Clicking the "Join our club!" button on the front page of the website will add you to the mailing list. The club website is located here: https://vcu.campusgroups.com/
We are holding two introductory meetings next week (the first week of September). The first meeting will be on Tuesday, September 3rd at 4pm. This is our first time trying a meeting at this time; we thought it would be better to vary the times so that the club could accomodate more people's schedules, including the schedule of our new club advisor (more on that later). The second meeting will be at our usual time, Thursday, September 5th at 7pm. Like always, meetings will be held in Starke House (915 W Franklin) in the conference room, Room 101. (Remember that the front door locks at 7pm on weekdays; just knock on the door and one of us will let you in.) Both meetings are going to be pretty much the same, so I don't recommend going to both, but you can go to both of them if you really enjoy listening to club policies and stuff. Depending on your device, there should be a link to RSVP for either meeting at the bottom of this email. Regular meetings will resume the following week; day TBA. The full list of scheduled events is on the club website, which includes information for how to RSVP. Officially, all these events are listed as lasting an hour, but you all know our track record for ending after only an hour.
It's important to us to know the interests and philosophical experience of everyone that's coming to club, so that we can tailor the best experience for everyone. That's why we make a survey every semester to collect this information from club members. Everyone, including those who are unsure about whether they want to join the club, is encouraged to fill out this survey. The survey is posted on the club website, and can be accessed by following this link: https://vcu.campusgroups.com/
Our officer team has changed pretty substantially since last semester. Max, the former Treasurer, has graduated from VCU; this means he can no longer officially serve as an officer. However, Max still plans on attending meetings and helping out where he can. Alec, the former Vice President, is currently on medical leave from VCU. He doesn't have time to serve as an officer, but he told me he still wants to come to meetings when he is able. This means that we have both a new Treasurer and a new VP for the Fall 2019 semester. Kaleigh Hodges will be serving as our new Treasurer and Heather Price will be serving as our new VP. Both of them are seniors in the philosophy department and I'm excited to have them participate in managing the club. Hopefully, you all will be able to get to know them better at the introductory meetings next week - they will be present for both.
Our faculty advisor has also changed. As we announced at the end of last semester, Professor Andrew Alwood, our previous advisor, has moved on to work at another institution. Our new advisor is Professor Jamie Fritz, who is also new to the VCU Philosophy Department. He is primarily interested in metaethics and epistemology. You can learn more about him and his work on his website. Although our previous advisor didn't usually attend meetings, Professor Fritz will be attending all or most Tuesday meetings. He will be there to introduce himself and meet everyone at the Tuesday interest meeting next week.
As one last point: like last year, the Philosophy Club is working with the Philosophy Department to bring a guest speaker from another university for both the Fall and the Spring semesters. This is part of the Philosophy and Public Affairs (PPA) lecture series; however, the lecture topics are not necessarily explicitly related to public affairs. Usually, the PPA includes a large public lecture intended for a general audience on a Thursday night, and then a small colloquium in the philosophy conference room the following Friday afternoon. This Fall, our PPA speaker will be Ross Cameron, and he will be presenting his public lecture on November 7th with a colloquium on November 8th. Although the speaker and the date are set, the event has not yet been officially announced because the location and topic hasn't been decided. If you want to learn more about our speaker, you can read about him on his website. In his own words, he is interested in "the metaphysics of x, for most x." He has published a book about the philosophy of time.
That should be all for now. I promise this will be the longest email I send this semester.
Good luck in your classes, and I hope to see you all at the interest meetings next week!
Sarah