Janine Turner, Cathy Gillespie, and Constituting America’s Student Ambassadors, Tova Love Kaplan and Dakare Chatman, chat with Constitutional experts on hot-topic issues via Zoom!
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This Week’s Expert Guest: Dr. Colleen SheehanColleen A. Sheehan is Professor of Political Science and Director of Graduate Studies in the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University. She has served in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and on the Pennsylvania State Board of Education. She has been an Earhart Fellow, Bradley Fellow, Mary and Kennedy Smith Fellow, and Garwood Fellow at the James Madison Program of Princeton University. Sheehan is author of The Mind of James Madison: The Legacy of Classical Republicanism (Cambridge University Press, 2015), James Madison and the Spirit of Republican Self-Government (Cambridge University Press, 2009), Friends of the Constitution: Writings of the “Other” Federalists, 1787-88 (with Gary L. McDowell, Liberty Fund Press, 1998), and The Cambridge Companion to The Federalist (with Jack Rakove, Cambridge University Press, 2020). She has published in journals such as The American Political Science Review, William and Mary Quarterly, Review of Politics, and Persuasions: The Jane Austen Journal. Her current projects include The World of Emma Woodhouse (an interpretation of Jane Austen’s Emma) and “Madison’s America
Tuesday, August 11, 2pm ET: Article I of the U.S. Constitution
Tuesday, August 18, 2pm ET: Article II of the U.S. Constitution
Tuesday, August 25, 2pm ET: Article III of the U.S. Constitution
Tuesday, September 1: 2pm ET: Article IV & V of the U.S. Constitution
Tuesday, September 8: 2pm ET: Article VI & VII of the U.S. Constitution
Tuesday, September 15: 2pm ET: The Preamble & The Constitutional Convention
Actress Janine Turner is famous for her role as Maggie O’Connell in televisions’ Northern Exposure. She is the Founder and Co-President of Constituting America which launched in 2010. She is still acting but she is also actively teaching kids about the U.S. Constitution given over 540 speeches to classrooms across the country.
Cathy Gillespie is the co-president of Constituting America and one of 16 private citizens serving on the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission, helping organize the celebration of our country’s 250th birthday in 2026! She is a former Congressional Chief of Staff and former Commissioner of the White House Fellows Commission.
Tova Love Kaplan is sixteen years old and lives in Chicago, Illinois. She currently serves as the National Youth Director for Constituting America, and runs the National Youth Advisory Council. She is a three-time winner of the “We the Future” contest in the Entrepreneurial (where she created a marketing plan), PSA (entitled “Know Your Rights. Read The Constitution”) and STEM (where she created an app). She is passionate about educating and empowering young people to use their constitutional rights!
Constituting America Student Ambassador Dakare Chatman is 16 years old, and is currently a junior, full-time college student in South Carolina. He has won Constituting America’s We The Future Contest twice, once for best PSA where he reminded viewers the Constitution is “An American Thing, So Know It” and twice for his short film “Man On The Street.” He is also actively involved in our National Youth Advisory Board. He’s a working actor seen most recently in HBO’s The Righteous Gemstones and on April 15 in Netflix’s: Outer Banks. Dakare wishes to be an actor, but also a politician. But says you must be an actor to be a politician.