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ESF Lecture Series

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About the ESF Lecture Series

ESF sponsors a lecture series featuring prominent intellectuals (from Stanford and elsewhere) lecturing on the nature and meaning of liberal education. These lectures are required for students enrolled in ESF, but they are open to the public. All first year students, in particular, are encouraged to attend, and students not enrolled in ESF may enroll in the lecture series only for 1 unit (ESF 50). Lectures constitute an ongoing, campus-wide conversation about the aims of liberal education that extends the “First Lecture” featured as part of New Student Orientation.