Jack Miller Center for Teaching America's Founding Principles and History

The Jack Miller Center for Teaching America's Founding Principles and History (JMC) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that provides resources to college educators interested in fostering the development of academic programs designed to teach and study the American founding and Western political philosophy. The Jack Miller Center was established in Philadelphia in September 2007 by Jack Miller, a prominent entrepreneur and philanthropist. Mr. Miller was the founder of the Quill Corporation, a direct-mail office supply company, which was sold to Staples, Inc. in 1998. As of September 1, 2011, the Jack Miller Center had nearly 500 faculty partners on 179 college campuses, and is supporting 44 partner programs at Ivy League Institutions, flagship state universities and leading liberal arts colleges across the United States.

Programs

The Jack Miller Center has developed a number of programs designed to facilitate faculty development and student engagement in Western philosophy and American studies.

Faculty Development Institutes

The flagship initiative and point of entry into the Jack Miller Center faculty development program is a series of annual national Faculty Development Institutes at major university campuses. These institutes stimulate academic course and program development, provide young professors and post-doctoral students focused workshops on strategies to secure tenure and career advancement, and create a network of emerging and renowned academics committed to the common goal of teaching America's founding principles.

The institutes give young professors and advanced graduate students an opportunity to come together for two weeks of intellectual, cultural and academic seminars and discussions. Led by established scholars, institute Fellows participate in seminars that examine the central ideas and questions surrounding American political development. Seminars help participants develop new ideas for original research and fresh approaches to the questions that have long animated discussions of American society. In addition, the seminars offer participants the chance to observe the teaching methods of more experienced scholars and professors.

Academic Centers

Academic centers offer the greatest potential to develop student interest in learning about America's founding principles, and to cultivate future generations of teachers who are equipped to teach them. In many university settings, an academic center on America's founding principles can provide a focus for institutional recognition of studies related to the founding principles. Many centers offer courses and undergraduate degrees and build student demand for new programs.

The Miller Center provides start-up funds and support for new centers, and assists in identifying fund sources for growth and capacity building phases of existing Centers. The Miller Center supports a range of efforts that are undertaken by centers including lectures, conferences, workshops, graduate student and post-doctoral fellowships, visiting professorships, publishing and reading rooms.

A center can serve as a focal point for diverse academic disciplines to engage in civil discussion and cross-fertilization of ideas. While the majority of scholars engaged in the study of the founding principles come from the humanities and social sciences, academic centers provide opportunities for scholars in business, law, and economics to contribute to and benefit from the central ideas that are the source of our nation's strength.

Because higher education providers are diverse, ranging from Ivy League schools to large public universities to community colleges, academic center initiatives require tailored goals and strategies. Consequently, the Miller Center works with partners to develop models appropriate to each type of university or college. These models then can be emulated by peer institutions and can significantly impact the number of faculty teaching and the number of students learning the founding principles of our nation.

To assist in their creation and development, the Miller Center conducts annual Center Building Summits that provide networking opportunities, training and best practices sharing among existing Center professionals and those seeking to develop new Centers. The Miller Center also offers on-going professional resources and guidance in the areas of development, curriculum, programming, fundraising, capacity building and public relations.