MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — With the nation celebrating its 250th birthday this year, Middle Tennessee State University’s events planned for the milestone go beyond the July 4 holiday.

In the July edition of “Out of the Blue,” John Vile, dean of MTSU’s University Honors College, and Amy Sayward, director of MTSU’s American Democracy Project, joined program host Andrew Oppmann to discuss the events planned on campus that go beyond a single semi-quincentennial celebration.

An Honors Lecture Series was held in the spring, and another is planned in the fall.

“The goal has been to communicate the ideals of the Declaration of Independence to every student on campus sometime this calendar year,” explained Sayward.

Vile added, “It’s similar to what we do for Constitution Day, which this year, we’re tying the two together, but it’s not just a formulistic reading of the Constitution. People need to know what the ideals and principles are.”

The American Democracy Project, an initiative of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, promotes voter education and voter registration on campus and civic engagement.

“We want all of our students to be ready to leave the classroom and be active citizens and practice those citizenship skills even when they’re students,” Sayward said.

“Student engagement is what it’s about, and whatever a student is majoring in, they’re going to be citizens, and we hope they’re going to be productive citizens,” Vile said.

Each year on Constitution Day, the American Democracy Project reads the Constitution across campus for that entire week. A professor of constitutional law is this year’s Constitution Day speaker.

Vile explained, “She will be talking with four of our MTSU students on the question of ‘What might the founding fathers think about today’s Supreme Court?’ So that will give them a lot of food for conversation.”

In addition to on-campus events, the American Democracy Project is also participating in events at Cannonsburgh Pioneer Village in Murfreesboro.

“We’ll have an exhibit of how Americans have commemorated all of the big anniversaries of the Declaration of Independence; it’s marching through those anniversaries, and we’re also using some of our Honors lectures from the spring semester, and be giving ‘Lunch and Learn talks,’” Sayward said.  

At the end of September, a “Party Like it’s 1776” event is planned.

“I can’t wait for that; the student organization that’s connected to the American Democracy Project is going to do a ‘Rock the Vote’ concert,” Sayward explained. “The ‘Rock the Vote’ national organization gave us permission to use that name, and I said we have to tie it to the semi-quincentennial, so it’s ‘Party Like it’s 1776.’”

Sayward said students are working to recruit artists for the event, tentatively scheduled for Sept. 30.

Ways to watch, listen

• “Out of the Blue” is available anytime on the university’s YouTube channel, the True Blue TV channel, Roku, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV.

• It also airs on Murfreesboro cable Channel 9 daily at 6 a.m., 11 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.; Sundays; WKRN+ at 7 p.m. Thursdays and noon Sundays; WNPX “The Spot – Nashville 28” at 4:30 a.m. on Saturdays; and streamed on the MTSU Jazz Network through WMOT.org at 7 a.m. on the first Sunday of each month; and on other cable outlets in Middle Tennessee, so check local listings.

• It is also available as a podcast on iTunes and Google Play and as individual interview segments on Spotify at https://spoti.fi/453hxg3.

Watch previous episodes of “Out of the Blue” at https://mtsunews.com/out-of-the-blue.

—       DeAnn Hays ([email protected])