Press Release - The International Freedom Center

February, 2005

Leading advocates of service shape Center's engagement program

One of the unique features of the International Freedom Center will be its “engagement” program, seeking to integrate service into the Center’s museum component, providing those inspired by visits to the Center’s building or web site with opportunities for service on behalf of freedom.

To shape this unprecedented effort, the International Freedom Center has forged a partnership with Civic Enterprises and its founder, President and CEO, John Bridgeland. Bridgeland and Civic Enterprises will be working with the Center to develop an engagement program.

Bridgeland brings a wealth of experience to this effort. He served as Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council early in the first term of President George W. Bush, and later as Director of the USA Freedom Corps, the parent agency of both the Peace Corps and AmeriCorps, as well as a host of federal volunteer service initiatives.

Among those joining Bridgeland in this work will be Civic Enterprises Policy Council members Harris Wofford and Robert Putnam. Wofford is a former United States Senator from Pennsylvania, a White House Special Assistant on civil rights to President Kennedy, one of the founders of the Peace Corps and head of Americorps under President Clinton. Putnam, author of "Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community", is a former Dean of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and remains a professor of public policy at Harvard.

Working closely with Bridgeland and the Civic Enterprises colleagues will be International Freedom Center Planning Committee member Max Stier, President and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service.

In undertaking this work, John Bridgeland said, “We believe that the International Freedom Center can become a central nervous system for fostering a culture of service and civic engagement in the United States and around the world.”

Center President Richard Tofel rejoined, “The International Freedom Center’s engagement program will be one of the key factors setting this new institution apart from those that have gone before. Having John Bridgeland and his colleagues to help show us the way is a critical addition toour growing Center team.”

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