Bridgewater State University
Bridgewater State University
Dr. Michael J. Kryzanek Shares His Views
on American Democracy in 2026
On Wednesday, February 4, 2026, Dr. Michael J. Kryzanek, professor emeritus of the Department of Political Science, was the featured speaker at the Retired Faculty Club luncheon and he spoke on the topic of "American Democracy in 2026"
"Thank you all for coming and for anybody who's here who is in a good mood, that's frankly not my objective today," he said iin his opening remarks at the event, which was held in the Heritage Room of the Maxwell Library.
"What you have here [he had distributed an outline of his remarks to the audience] is a paper with questions I think we need to consider and then you'll see my responses to each question. My purpose is to be helpful to you as we attempt to more fully understand where I believe we are at the present time.
"First question, how would you describe the current state of the United States? Are we polarized beyond belief? Are we on the brink of economic collapse? Could we experience a new kind of civil war? In a 2024 gala poll, 80% of adults said America is deeply divided. I don't think that number has gone down at all since then," he said.
Dr. Kryzanek pointed to other issues: "Unfortunately, rising violence, gorilla style conflict and similar upheavals are in the news every day. With ICE, President Trump has his own private army which seems to continually make extremely unpleasant headlines."
To see Part One of his remarks, please click on the link below.
To see Part Two of his remarks, please click on the link below:
Above, members of the Retired Faculty Club who were in attendance at the February 4, 2026, luncheon. A video of the question-answer session at the event is available below:
Meet the New Coordinator of BSU's Cyber Range
We're grateful to Ms. Heather Harris Michonski, G '26, of the university's
Office of Enrollment, Marketing, and Communications, for sharing with us the story of Mr. Michael Khouri, who is the new coordinator of the university Cyber Range, BSU's landmark high-tech, state-of-the-art facility designed to simulate real-world threats and cyberattacks, providing training and real-time intervention to prevent a myriad of assaults on the World Wide Web.
Please click on link below to read the story:
Walk Down History Lane:
The Class of 1963 Looks Back (second edition)
The College Yearbook - first published at Bridgewater in 1899, last published in 2003- is a treasure trove of 104 years of BSU history.
Like so many printed publications, the advent of the web made yearbooks an anachronism.
But occasionally we travel back in time to view, thanks to the fact that all existing BSU yearbooks are published on the web (credit Dr. Orson Kinglsey, head of Special Collections and Archives).
And so in this week's edition we a video we recorded in 2013 of the Class of 1963 as they gathered to celebrate their 50th anniversary.
Ms. Elizabeth Sawin, seen above as women's sports editor, is featured as is the man she would marry, her classmate Paul Callahan, a legendary BSU athlete (photo below):
Joining them in the video are Ms. Doreeen Dillman Reichartd; Ms.Jackie Ryder Moore; Ms. Marilyn Hanson Swain and Ms. Joan Hanley Smith.
Click below to see the video:
This concludes the report for Monday, February 9, 2026