ENACT: The Abraham Feinberg Educational Network for Active Civic Transformation

History: A Timeline

provost and husband and wife benefactors signing papers while seated at table.
Provost Lisa Lynch, left, and benefactors Norbert Weissberg, right, and his wife, Judith Schneider, sign the gift agreement establishing ENACT.
2024
ENACT: The Educational Network for Active Civic Transformation has been renamed ENACT: The Abraham Feinberg Educational Network for Active Civic Transformation to honor the late Abraham Feinberg.
2023
ENACT hosts its third in-person institute for faculty fellows, convening faculty members from 22 colleges and universities across the United States at Brandeis University.
2021
ENACT expands to all 50 states and hosts its first virtual institute.
2020

ENACT extends its reach to 45 states.

2016

  • The first cohort of Faculty Fellows joins the ENACT program.

  • ENACT programs are established at 15 additional colleges and universities located in or near state capitals. Many programs feature advocacy efforts based on a single state issue, while others target federal policy.

July 2015

The program is formally launched.

April 2015

Norbert Weissberg, a member of the Ethics Center's International Advisory Board, and his wife, Judith Schneider, a former board member, make a gift establishing ENACT: The Educational Network for Active Civic Transformation — a national program, based at Brandeis, that builds upon the Advocacy for Policy Change initiative.

Spring 2010

The Legal Studies program introduces the course Advocacy for Policy Change (LGLS 161b), taught by Melissa Stimell, as the centerpiece of the Advocacy for Policy Change initiative. The course combines an investigation of the ethical dilemmas that arise in the process of lawmaking with hands-on advocacy work with entities seeking to reform laws or to propose new ones.

2009

The precursor to the ENACT program, the Advocacy for Policy Change initiative, is established at Brandeis by the International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life (Ethics Center). The program is designed to encourage citizens to bring moral and ethical insights to the process of making and revising laws.