Ronald Gross has been elected to the Hall of Fame of the International Adult and Continuing Education Association (www.halloffame.outreach.ou.edu).

The Hall of Fame, located at the University of Oklahoma’s Oklahoma Center for Continuing Education, “honors leaders in the fields of continuing education and adult learning (and) serves as a record and inspiration for the next generation of continuing education leaders. Election acknowledges that these men and women have made distinguished contributions to the field of adult and continuing education. These innovative leaders have believed passionately in the evolutionary power of education. All are themselves exemplary lifelong learners and have left lasting impressions on the students, institutions, and organizations they have served.”

Gross will be inducted on November 19th at the annual ceremony, held this year concomitant with the Sloan Consortium Conference in Lake Buena Vista, Florida.

Currently, Gross co-chairs the University Seminar on Innovation in Education at Columbia University (www.columbiaseminar.org), where he also holds regular Socratic Conversations with students and faculty at Teacher’s College (www.socratesway.com/join.html). He also provides Creative Aging programs under a grant from the Greentree Fund (www.olderbetterwiser.com), and encourages more and better street-level conversations for New Yorkers through a voluntary association, Conversations New York (www.conversationsnewyork.com). He often champions lifelong learning by appearing as Socrates (www.SocratesWay.com).

Gross’ books in the field include The Lifelong Learner, Peak Learning, The Independent Scholar’s Handbook, Socrates’ Way, Radical School Reform, The New Old, The New Professionals, and Individualism.

Buckminster Fuller wrote about his work:

“If humanity is to pass safely through its present crisis on earth, it will be because a majority of individuals are now doing their own thinking. Ronald Gross has pioneered in improving the climate for such thinking.”

Gross has supported lifelong learning initiatives in Europe, the Far East, Israel, Canada, and Mexico, sponsored by agencies such as the European Foundation for Management Development, the United Nations Educational, Social and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the Ford and Rothschild Foundations.