On May 22-24, Second Journey held its first international Visioning Council at the KörberForum in Hamburg, Germany. The keynote presentation was given by Prof. Andreas Kruse, who is director of the Institute for Gerontology at the University of Heidelberg and an advisor to the German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The American team included Bolton Anthony, Janet Hively, and John Sullivan.

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Bios of the American Team
with links to their presentations

Bolton Anthony, Ed.D., is the founder of Second Journey, a social change NGO that pro­motes “mindfulness, service, and community in the second half of life.” He has worked as a teacher of English and creative writing to university students, a public librarian, a university adminis­trator, and a social change activist who lead a community-wide commemoration to mark the centennial anniversary of a race riot in North Carolina. He is interested in public discourse and the restoration of civil society and is passionate about the emergence of a new paradigm of aging that will energize the generation approaching retirement.

View presentation "The Unimagined City: Hamburg and the Opportunities of Age"

Janet M. Hively, Ph.D., has been recognized as a National Purpose Prize Fellow, based on her work as a social entrepreneur in developing and managing non-profit networks to address social needs. She  has co-founded the Minnesota Vital Aging Network; SHiFT, whose mission is "empowering midlife moves to meaning in life and work”; and the Minnesota Creative Arts and Aging Network. Dr. Hively came to her focus on vital aging from past careers in planning and administration for several non-profit and public organizations. She has recently received the 2008 Gerontologist of the Year Award from the Minnesota Gerontologist Society. Her degrees are from Harvard University and the University of Minnesota.

View presentation "Transforming Expectations for Aging

Patricia Munro is the founding member of World Café Europe e.V., a European-wide network whose purpose is to foster the use of the world café dialogue process with communities throughout Europe. She was a key member of the Planning Team for the 1^st World Café European Gathering in Dresden in 2007 and is currently collaborating on the design of the 2nd World Café European Gathering to be held in Bilbao, Spain in June 2008. She is a partner in the consulting network Cultural Consulting Group, which focuses on the use of dialogue to create strategy, manage audience-driven projects, and assess the impact of cultural projects.

A much-loved teacher at Elon University in North Carolina, Powell Professor of Philosophy Emeritus John G. Sullivan was named Elon's first Distinguished University Professor in 2002. He is the author of Living Large: Transformative Work at the Intersection of Ethics and Spirituality. He also serves on the faculty of Tai Sophia Institute in Maryland.  Dr. Sullivan's abiding interest is in the place where philosophy, psychology and spirituality — East, West and beyond — intersect and mutually enhance one another.

View presentation "Stillness and Service in Three Contexts"