MEDIA LITERACY, CIVIC ENGAGEMENT AND DEMOCRACY PROJECT:

Jonathan Friedman

Jonathan Friedman, Ph.D., is the Sy Syms managing director of U.S. free expression programs at PEN America. He oversees research, advocacy, and education related to academic freedom, educational gag orders, book bans, and general free expression in schools, colleges, and universities.

An interdisciplinary scholar by training, Friedman has served as lead author on PEN America’s reports, Banned in the USA: The Growing Movement to Censor Books in Schools (2022), Banned in the USA: Rising School Book Bans Threaten Free Expression and Students’ First Amendment Rights (2022), 

Educational Gag Orders: Legislative Restrictions on the Freedom to Read, Learn, and Teach (2021), and Chasm in the Classroom: Campus Free Speech in a Divided America (2020).

Mr. Friedman regularly provides commentary for news media about educational censorship, and has published op-eds for CNN, The Washington Post, The Hill, The Daily Beast, New York Daily News, and Inside Higher Ed.

Descendants Portrait Project

at Boyden Gallery 
through December 12

The Dwight Frederic Boyden Gallery at SMCM is pleased to host the exhibit, Sharing our common humanity from common ground (the first 38), during the fall semester. The exhibit features artist Nicole Stewart's initial group of completed portraits of descendants of the former Sotterley plantation (known now as Historic Sotterley) located in Hollywood, Maryland. The show will remain open until December 12, 2025. 

There will be a series of discussion panels with Sotterley descendants. They will share their stories, insights and feelings about their Sotterley connections and about preserving the past. The next Descendants Panels will be in Upper Montgomery Hall Commons on:

• Monday, November 3, 2025, 4:45 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.

You can follow Nicole Stewart on Facebook and Instagram.

The Boyden Gallery is located on the 2nd floor of Montgomery Hall and is open Tuesday-Friday 11 am-6 pm and Saturdays 11 am-4 pm