This interactive lunch workshop features a student-led conversation with Dr. Matthew Levendusky, a Penn political science professor, about his researched-based advice for engaging in constructive dialogue about politics and the upcoming US election. Learn strategies to depolarize your conversations, adapt them to your individual goals, and practice your new skills with fellow participants. This event is open to the entire Penn community, including students, faculty and staff.
Copies of Dr. Levendusky’s recent book titled Our Common Bonds: Using What Americans Share to Help Bridge the Partisan Divide, will be available to the first 50 attendees.
Lunch will be served. Advance registration for this event is required. Penn Leads the Vote will also have a table at the event just outside of the pavilion.
Sponsored by SNF Paideia, Penn Libraries, and the Costa Family Building Bridges Fund.
This event is part of a co-branded series of events in partnership with the SNF Paideia Program, Robert A. Fox Leadership Program/Penn Program on Opinion Research and Election Studies (PORES), Red and Blue Exchange (RBX), and many other campus collaborators.
About Matthew Levendusky
Matthew Levendusky is professor of Political Science, as well as the Stephen and Mary Baran Chair in the Institutions of Democracy at the Annenberg Public Policy Center. He also holds a secondary appointment in the Annenberg School for Communication. He was previously the Penny and Robert A. Fox Director of the Fels Institute of Government (2018-2023), Distinguished Fellow in the Institutions of Democracy at the Annenberg Public Policy Center (2017-2019), as well as graduate group chairperson (2013-2018), associate professor (2013-2018), and assistant professor of Political Science at Penn (2007-2013), as well as a postdoctoral research associate at the Center for the Study of American Politics at Yale University (2006-2007). He obtained his Ph.D. from Stanford University in 2006, and his BA (with highest honors) from The Pennsylvania State University in 2001. From 2014 until 2024, he served as a decision desk analyst for NBC News.