The Forum

President W.R. Davies was the prime mover in establishing The Forum within the first year of his administration, to bring to life his vision of the college as a cultural center. He transformed Eau Claire's after-dinner speakers club into a college-community partnership that selected an average of five speakers a year. The Forum is committed to the concept of non-discrimination as related to race, creed, sexual orientation, age and physical disability.

Tickets for one or all events are available through the University Service Center.
$8.00 | General Public + UWEC Faculty/Staff
$2.00 | UWEC Students & Children ages 17 and under

Visit the Service Center in Davies Center’s east lobby.
Call 715-836-INFO [4636] or 800-949-UWEC [8932].
PURCHASE ONLINE

AC Dumlao, is a transgender non-binary first-generation Filipinx-American activist and educator, and creator of the Facebook page “Call Me They.” AC was honored as a Grand Marshal in the 2024 NYC Pride March, named an “emerging voice” by NBC Asian America for their inaugural Redefine A to Z series, has been featured in Mashable’s “30 Days of Pride: The LGBTQ figures making history right now,” and has been named as a NPR "Source of the Week." 

With “Call Me They,” they began their work of educating on the issues of non-binary visibility, Asian and Filipino representation, “genderfull” fashion and aesthetics, and much more, all through an intersectional lens. Their professional expertise is in working with companies' HR and D&I departments and LGBTQ+ ERGs and BRGs to advise on trans and non-binary inclusive policies, such as best practices on sharing gender pronouns in the workplace. They have been seen presenting at national LGBTQ+ conferences including The LGBTQ+ Bar’s Lavender Law, the National LGBTQ Task Force’s Creating Change, and the Philadelphia Trans Wellness Conference. 

Highlights of their media work include co-hosting an advance screening/live talkback with Lisa Ling for the CNN Original Series’ episode This is Life with Lisa Ling: Gender Fluidity and appearing on ABC News Live. AC’s activist work and words have been featured in publications including The Huffington Post, VICE Media, Allure Magazine, Business Insider, Autostraddle, Mic.com, and The Advocate and they have received honors from Parity and the New York State Comptroller. 

Additionally, AC is passionate about providing representation to queer and trans young people of color and has given keynotes at high schools and colleges across the country. An alum of Vassar College, AC serves as co-chair of Vassar’s LGBTQ+ alums group and Board Director for Vassar’s Alumnae/i Association. AC lives and works with gratitude on the traditional and unceded homelands of the Lenape Canarsie people with their wife, Caitlin.

Matthew Mercer is a Los Angeles-based actor best known for his roles in animation and video games, as well as the massively popular hit show and media brand, Critical Role. 

Critical Role has become one of the most popular storytelling and world building independent media companies in the world, and Matthew plays a pivotal role within the company as Chief Creative Officer, primary cast member, and executive producer of The Legend of Vox Machina animated series which will air exclusively on Amazon Prime Video. As CCO, Matthew helps shape the overall creative vision of the company, helping it become the powerhouse organization it is today. 

In addition to Critical Role, Matthew’s extensive training in theater, improv, and being a life-long hardcore gamer helped prepare him for mainstream pop culture projects and characters such as: Cole Cassidy in Overwatch, Ganondorf in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Hermes in Netflix’s Blood of Zeus, Yusuke Kitagawa in Persona 5 Royal & Persona 5 Strikers, Captain Levi in Attack on Titan, Goro Majima in Yakuza: Like a Dragon, Gangplank and Kindred (Wolf) in League of Legends, Rexxar, Nefarian, and Ragnaros in Hearthstone, Trafalgar Law in One Piece, Kanji Tatsumi in Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, Persona Q, and Persona 4: Dancing All Night, Jotaro Kujo in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Chrom in Fire Emblem: Awakening, Fire Emblem Heroes and Super Smash Bros, and numerous other projects. 

Mercer was named Voice Actor of the Year at the 2017 BTVA People's Choice Voice Acting Awards for his role as McCree, where he also received a win for Best Vocal Ensemble in a Video Game. He has also received three BTVA People's Choice Voice Acting Awards, two BTVA Video Game Voice Acting Awards, a BTVA Video Game Voice Acting Award and a BTVA Anime Dub Television/OVA Voice Acting Award.

Sean Astin is an American film actor, director, voice artist and producer, best known for his film roles as Samwise Gamgee in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Mikey Walsh in The Goonies, the title character of Rudy, and Bob Newby in Netflix’s hit series, Stranger Things 2. He is also the author of the New York Times best-selling There and Back Again, a memoir – co-written with Joe Layden – of his film career with emphasis on his experiences with the Lord of the Rings trilogy. 

Son of Academy Award winning actress Patty Duke and acclaimed actor John Astin, Sean Astin scored a career defining, triumphant success in the inspirational and universally applauded college football biopic Rudy, about the life-changing struggles and rewards of the title character, Daniel Ruettiger. In the early 2000s, he experienced another career breakthrough with his role as Samwise Gamgee in Peter Jackson’s the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, released in 2001, 2002 and 2003. Along with the many awards bestowed upon the trilogy – eleven Academy Awards, including Best Picture – Astin received nominations for his own performance. He took home the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor and awards from the Las Vegas Film Critics Society, the Seattle Film Critics, the Utah Film Critics Association and the Phoenix Film Critics Society. 

Sean Astin attended the Crossroads High School for the Arts and later a master class at the Stella Adler Conservatory in Los Angeles. He graduated from UCLA with a B.A. in History and English. An alumnus of Los Angeles Valley College, he served on the school’s Board of Directors of the Patrons Association and the Arts Council. Since Lord of the Rings , Astin has served on the board of several non-profit organizations, including the National Center for Family Literacy. A vocal advocate for literacy, mental health awareness, bi-polar disorder, civic engagement and other issues, Astin is an energetic, passionate speaker who promotes a culture of volunteerism to all audiences.

STEVEN PINKER asks the big questions about human progress and sets out, in public, to answer them. In Rationality, he explores why—when humanity is reaching new heights of scientific reasoning—there appears to be more fake news, conspiracy theorizing, and medical quackery than ever before. Rejecting the cynicism that humans are inherently irrational, Pinker offers an insightful, hopeful analysis of what rationality really is, why it can feel like it’s scarce, and how we can use it to drive better choices in our personal lives and in the public sphere.

A provocative speaker, much in demand, Steven Pinker is a cognitive scientist who has been named by TIME as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World. His keynotes have helped millions demystify the science behind human language, thought, and action. Pinker is a Harvard professor, a TED speaker, and a bestselling author, twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Highly respected in the scientific community, his work and opinions are extensively covered in the mainstream media and have won a wide general audience. In his latest book, Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters, Pinker argues that we fail to take advantage of the most powerful tools of reasoning discovered by some of our best thinkers: logic, critical thinking, probability, correlation and causation. These tools are not a standard part of our educational curricula and have never been presented clearly and entertainingly in a single book—until now. Recently named one of Amazon’s best science books of the year, Rationality is an enriching, inspiring, and captivating new read on how to harness rationality to improve our personal lives and advance social progress.

A native of Montreal, Steven Pinker is Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. Previously, he taught at Stanford and at MIT. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has won a number of teaching prizes, and his research on visual cognition and the psychology of language has received numerous awards, including the Troland Award from the National Academy of Sciences.