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The day began with a morning talk with a U.S. senator discussing details of the upcoming midterm elections and ended in the evening with a top executive of the world鈥檚 second-largest retail company explaining the intricacies of his job. In between, a panel including two former White House appointees tackled the thorny topic of the handling of classified information. Just a typical day at the .
- U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy (R-La.) was the guest for of Public Affairs 鈥淔irst Tuesday鈥 series, which took place at 9 a.m. at Fenwick Library鈥檚 Main Reading Room in Fairfax. Cassidy joined Pearlstein and students鈥攎any of them Schar School Democracy Lab Learning Community participants鈥攆or a discussion regarding November鈥檚 bellwether congressional elections; he also described his experience as a medical doctor serving the uninsured and detailed what led him to run for public office. The next 鈥淔irst Tuesday鈥 guest is GOP media strategist (and Mason grad) Danny Diaz on Tuesday, September 27, also at 9 a.m. The speaker series is open to all. The complete schedule is here.
- Why does information become classified, and what does that mean? And what are the ramifications if classified material isn鈥檛 secured and falls into the wrong hands? Who better to answer those questions than Schar School Distinguished Visiting Professor , former acting director and deputy director of the CIA, and , director of the and former senior director of the White House Situation Room. They were joined at 7 p.m. in the Hayden Center鈥檚 first live event in two years鈥攃alled 鈥淜eeping Secrets鈥濃攂y former National Security Legal Adviser Mary DeRosa and chief security officer for Ball Aerospace and former White House senior director for records access and information security management John Fitzpatrick. Morell moderated the conversation which drew some 75 attendees to the auditorium at Van Metre Hall at Mason Square and 95 watching via livestream. Another 355 have watched it at the Hayden Center鈥檚 YouTube channel this week.
- At 7:30 p.m. undergraduates from the Schar School鈥檚 new , Mason鈥檚 Patriot Pre-Law program, and the Scalia Law School Business Law Society hosted senior vice president and general counsel of Amazon David Zapolsky at Hazel Hall at Mason Square. Schar School assistant professor of legal studies Ally Coll moderated a conversation in which Zapolsky described how it is to manage a team of thousands of in-house lawyers and how he goes about addressing complex legal issues while conducting international commerce.
He also reflected on his own career path and gave advice to students about how to pursue their passions and find legal jobs that they will find both challenging and rewarding. His advice? Always be open to questioning the status quo, and don't assume something has to be done the way it's always been done in the past.