A Letter to Stephen Budiansky
Dear Mr. Budiansky,
While I fear that SAGES will never truly challenge Henry Kissinger, either in winning Nobel Prizes or in rendering satire obsolete, I enjoyed reading your article on Case Western Reserve University's Seminar Approach to General Education and Scholarship.
Given your interest in education, I wonder if you might like a chance to educate Case students by teaching a SAGES seminar. While most of our seminars are led by our accomplished faculty, a few seminars each semester are led by distinguished visitors -- former attorney generals, hospital CEOs, art curators, and even other op-ed writers.
If you apply, and are selected to lead a seminar of 17 students -- not a given, considering the quality of our applicant pool for these positions! -- I assure you that your classroom will be adjacent to SAGES Café. You and your fellow seminarians will be blessed with the aroma of intellectual virtue served by our authoritative SAGES baristas, or "Sagistas," as you ponder great questions of our time. We promise to work with you to make sure you are prepared to lead a discussion with our bright students. We have a 92-page primer that you may find useful as you begin your preparations.
As a token of our hopes and as an enticement to apply to teach our students, I am sending along a pound of our best Peet's coffee. You are of course welcome to keep the coffee even if we don't select you to lead a seminar.
Sincerely,
Peter Whiting
Director of SAGES
