{"id":6254,"date":"2026-02-16T15:35:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T15:35:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/?p=6254"},"modified":"2026-02-16T15:35:43","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T15:35:43","slug":"why-deliberate-an-interactive-debate-and-discussion-featuring-davidson-students-and-bridgeusa-ceo-manu-meel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/announcements\/why-deliberate-an-interactive-debate-and-discussion-featuring-davidson-students-and-bridgeusa-ceo-manu-meel\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Deliberate? An Interactive Debate and Discussion Featuring Davidson Students and BridgeUSA CEO Manu Meel"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-post-featured-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1300\" height=\"780\" src=\"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Flyer for Why Deliberate event featuring photo of Manu Meel\" style=\"object-fit:cover;\" srcset=\"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg 1300w, https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-300x180.jpg 300w, https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-1024x614.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-768x461.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1300px) 100vw, 1300px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Do you believe that some political divides are simply too deep to engage through conversation? Or do you think it is critical that we engage across our differences no matter how deep they are?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Manu Meel, Founder and CEO of BridgeUSA<\/strong>&nbsp;\u2013 the largest and fastest-growing student movement dedicated to empowering young people to improve the quality of politics \u2013 will explore these questions with Davidson students in a keynote address, deliberative debate, and audience discussion on&nbsp;<strong>Thursday, Feb. 19 at 5 p.m. in the 900 Room<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At 6 p.m., BridgeUSA will host a&nbsp;<strong>hands-on dialogue participation workshop<\/strong>&nbsp;for students interested in strengthening their skills in listening to \u2013 and speaking with \u2013 friends and family with whom they may deeply disagree.&nbsp;<strong>Chipotle<\/strong>&nbsp;will be served, and the event is eligible for&nbsp;<strong>EDU credit<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Co-hosted by the Deliberative Citizenship Initiative, the Center for Civic Engagement, and the Institute for Public Good, this event invites students have a wide range of perspectives on civil discourse \u2013 the committed, the skeptical, and the reserved \u2013 to examine the question:&nbsp;<strong>Why deliberate?<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Do you believe that some political divides are simply too deep to engage through conversation? Or do you think it is critical that we engage across our differences no matter how deep they are? Manu Meel, Founder and CEO of BridgeUSA&nbsp;\u2013 the largest and fastest-growing student movement dedicated to empowering young people to improve the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6256,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-announcements","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg","rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg",1300,780,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg",1300,780,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg",1300,780,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-180x180.jpg",180,180,true],"medium":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-300x180.jpg",300,180,true],"large":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-1024x614.jpg",1024,614,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg",1300,780,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px.jpg",1300,780,false],"mini-thumbnail":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-75x75.jpg",75,75,true],"team-member":["https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Davidson-College-x-BridgeUSA-1300-x-780-px-600x600.jpg",600,600,true]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Graham Bullock","author_link":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/author\/grbullock\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/category\/announcements\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Announcements<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"Do you believe that some political divides are simply too deep to engage through conversation? Or do you think it is critical that we engage across our differences no matter how deep they are? Manu Meel, Founder and CEO of BridgeUSA&nbsp;\u2013 the largest and fastest-growing student movement dedicated to empowering young people to improve the&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6254"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6258,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6254\/revisions\/6258"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deliberativecitizenship.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}