4/11/2022 COVID Update: The State of Maine no longer requires masking or proof of vaccination to attend any public events, but individual venues are free to do so. For the latest information, visit the Center for Disease Control and Prevention or the State of Maine’s COVID site.

Poverty, Inequality, and the Social Safety Net in the United States

Ostrove Auditorium, Diamond Building, Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

Tonight's speaker, Hilary Hoynes, Colby Class of '83, holds the Haas Distinguished Chair in Economic Disparities and is professor of public policy and economics at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. She specializes in the study of poverty, inequality, and the impacts of government tax and transfer programs […]

Free

Machine Learning and the Economics of Crime

Ostrove Auditorium, Diamond Building, Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

Professor Jens Ludwig, University of Chicago, will discuss the opportunities and challenges of using machine learning tools to help address what we call prediction policy problems. We show that the use of algorithmic predictions of risk to inform release decisions create the opportunity to simultaneously reduce crime, reduce jail populations, and reduce racial disparities within the […]

Free

Syria: The Gravest Humanitarian Crisis in a Generation

Parker-Reed Room, Schair-Swenson-Watson Alumni Center, Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

George Biddle, chairman of World Connect, will discuss what is being done to alleviate the Syrian people’s suffering, how Syria’s neighbors are faring, what the impact on Europe has been, and how the crisis is forcing the international community to reconsider its responses to refugee and humanitarian crises.

Free

Peace in Colombia?

Room 122, Diamond Bldg., Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

On Oct. 2, Colombians went to the polls for a historic vote: whether or not to accept the negotiated accord with the country’s largest and oldest guerrilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the FARC. The accord promises to end the longest running insurgency war in the hemisphere, and put a definitive end to […]

Free

Failure to Adjust: How Americans Fell Behind in the Global Economy

Room 122, Diamond Bldg., Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

In an election year in which controversies over trade, immigration, and job loss have dominated the presidential election campaign, Edward Alden will discuss how and why the U.S. government failed over the past half century to respond effectively to a more competitive global economy on issues such as trade, currency, investment and offshoring, worker re-training, […]

Free

Hospital Competition and Bargaining: Higher Prices or Greater Innovation?

Ostrove Auditorium, Diamond Building, Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

In recent years, many hospitals have merged, increasing the concentration of hospital markets and raising concerns about the price and quality of care. How is hospital consolidation affecting the already high health care expenditures in the U.S.? Because hospital competition for privately insured patients occurs through price negotiations between hospitals and insurers, an estimation of bargaining […]

Free

Gesture and Power: Religion, Nationalism, and Everyday Performance in Congo

Room 141, Diamond Bldg., Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

In her new book, Gesture and Power, Yolanda Covington-Ward, Department of Africana Studies, University of Pittsburgh, examines the everyday embodied practices and performances of the BisiKongo people of the Lower Congo to show how their gestures, dances, and spirituality are critical in mobilizing social and political action. This lecture will focus on two separate yet related […]

Free

Health Equity Gaps Among Women and Adolescents in Latin America and the Caribbean

Parker-Reed Room, Schair-Swenson-Watson Alumni Center, Colby College Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME

This year’s Hunt Lecture is by Arachu Castro, Samuel Z. Stone Chair of Public Health in Latin America at Tulane University’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. Income, education, place of residence, and ethnicity are some of the fundamental social determinants that help explain differences in health utilization and in health outcomes. Hear Castro analyze the […]

Free
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