At the 2013 World Universities Forum (WUF) held in Vancouver last week, I had the privilege not only of speaking about SFU's engagement activities, but also of receiving WUF’s 2012 Best Practices in Higher Education Award for the SFU Philosophers' Café.
 
This long-standing initiative, pioneered in 1998 by Yosef Wosk and currently directed by Michael Filimowicz, is a stellar example of our commitment to engaging communities.
 
The program facilitates free informal public discussions in the heart of the communities we serve. 

With a tagline that advocates “thinking the unthinkable, imagining the impossible, and discussing the improbable,” the Philosophers’ Café series has grown under the auspices of SFU Continuing Studies from a handful of intermittent coffee-shop encounters to hundreds of regular events in libraries, community centres, beaches and bistros across the Metro Vancouver region.
 
While similar gatherings are held in other cities around the world, the SFU series is the only one to be delivered by a single host institution.
 
Everyone is welcome to join these cafés where topics range from the absurd to the sublime, the scholarly to the religious, and from the deeply philosophical to the purely practical.
 
Besides the regular cafés, SFU has also developed cafés specifically for high school students, ethnic groups, and seniors.
 
Our moderators are drawn from a variety of backgrounds. They include artists, schoolteachers, SFU faculty, therapists, and members of the business and legal communities.
 
Accessible, inclusive and instructive, the Philosophers' Café series is one of the most enduring and compelling examples of how SFU is delivering on its strategic vision to be an "engaged university."
 
So if you're looking for a good reason to get out of the house during these long dark winter nights, be sure to check out the the schedule for upcoming cafes here.