Cobelligerency and the College Board

“You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.”-- Ray Bradbury

Wilberforce coined the term "cobelligerency" to describe his willingness to  work with people he disagreed with on specific causes they shared common concern over.  Several years ago, on a project I worked with for the Gates Foundation, I met David Coleman, currently head of The College Board.  Although we may disagree on a a number of issues, we did agree on C. S. Lewis' analysis of the decline in reading expressed in his book An Experiment in Criticism.

Karen Swallow Prior's excellent essay in Christianity Today (click here to read) describes a conversation we held to discuss the decline in reading, and the College Board's interest in working with the faith community to address it.Let me also draw your attention to two other excellent and recent articles on reading:  Cherie Harder's reflection from The Trinity Forum and a recent Wall Street Journal essay by Danny HetimanGood friends like Maggie Gallagher may differ with friends like Barrett Duke , Checker Finn, Bill Bennett and Mike Huckabee on approaches to promote critical thinking through "right reading", but we do all agree that without without a reading and thinking electorate, the future will be very difficult to navigate and our democracy is weakened.Also see:Repairing the Conservative School Reform Coalition by Chester E. Finn Jr. and Michael J. Petrilli (The Weekly Standard)Huckabee urges states to back Common Core by Ben Wolfgang (The Washington Times)