ACA Lecture Series: Our Speakers

Born and raised in Austin, she graduated from Reagan High School and earned a bachelor's degree in nursing (1974) and a master's in health education (1977), both from the University of Texas.

She has worked as a critical care nurse at Brackenridge and Seton hospitals, served as the first hospital-based Patient Education Coordinator in Austin, and helped get the Seton Good Health School off the ground. She has also been president of the Texas Nurses' Association (District 5) and a Health Education instructor at UT.

A recognized expert on public education, Howard served on the Eanes ISD board in West Austin from 1996 to 1999. She was a co-founder of Advocates for Eanes Schools and helped start the Texas Education Crisis Coalition, both grassroots organizations advocating for Texas public schools.

Certified as a Master School Trustee by the Texas Association of School Boards, Howard has served on the boards of the Austin Area Interreligious Ministries, Common Cause, and the Texas Freedom Network, and is currently a board member of the Expanding Horizons Foundation, supporting low-income housing and education.

During the 80th Legislative Session, Rep. Howard was appointed to the Higher Education and Culture, Recreation, and Tourism Committees. She also co-founded the Legislative Air Quality Caucus; a bipartisan group of more than forty legislators that worked to bring together House members and state and local officials in an effort to begin a dialog about how Texas can utilize the cleanest possible energy for the healthiest possible air. Since the end of session, Rep. Howard has received recognition for her work on health care, the environment, and historic preservation from several organizations including the Austin Business Journal, the Texas Hospital Association, the Sierra Club, and the Heritage Society of Austin.

Married to Austin attorney Derek Howard, the couple has three children, all educated in Austin-area public schools. Howard and her family are active in their neighborhood and in their church, where she has served on the board.

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Date	Speaker	Topic
December 8, 2013	TBA
November 10, 2013	TBA
October 13, 2013	TBA
September 8, 2013	Samer Ali	"What Do 1.6 billion Muslims Really Think: Beyond the Headlines and the Fear-mongering"
August 11, 2013	Innes Mitchell	"Perspective by Incongruity: Teaching Atheism at a Catholic University"
July 14, 2013	Don Baker	The Astounding Backwardness of the Christian Anti-Abortion Movement
June 9, 2013	Donald Wright	A Secular Perspective on the State of the Nation
May 12, 2013	Matt Dillahunty	Reflections on a "lifetime" as ACA President
April 14, 2013	Val Benavidez	Update on Church-State separation and education issues facing Texans
March 10, 2013	Hans Hofmann	Does Free Will Exist?
February 10, 2013	James Aldrete	The Political Landscape from the Consultant's Perspective
January 13, 2013	David Prindle	The Politics of Evolution
December 2, 2012	Darrel Ray	Religion and Sex (tentative)
November 4, 2012	Steve Bratteng	What's Eating You! An exploration of the evolving world of parasites. Visually gross, but fascinating.
October 7, 2012	James Dee, Ph. D.	The X-Rated Stories about Jesus: Weird Tales from the Apocryphal Gospels
September 22, 2012	Teresa MacBain	The Clergy Project and how she found freedom from religion
August 5, 2012	Sissy Bradford	Paying the Price for Defending Religious Freedom
July 1, 2012	Dr. Karl Gebhardt, University of Texas Professor of Astrophysics	“HETDEX”, The Hobby-Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment
June 3, 2012	Jerry DeWitt	Laughing through the Apocalypse!
April 1, 2012	Vic Cornell	The ACLU of Texas & Religious Freedom
March 4, 2012	Wrath James White, author and blogger	Escaping The Overseer: Atheism in Black America
February 5, 2012	Karl Gebhardt, UT Astronomy Dept	TBA
January 8, 2012	Steve Bratteng	Unintelligent Design: Deceit and Hypocrisy vs. Science
December 4, 2011	The Lord is Not on Trial Here Today	We'll be showing a documentary about the landmark Vashti McCollum school prayer case.
November 6, 2011	Gardner Selby, Austin American Statesman PolitiFact Texas Editor	Pants on Fire and Other Ways to Judge What Politicians Say
October 2, 2011	Dr. Bruce J. Hunt, Associate Professor of History, UT Austin	Darwin and Religion, or the Lack of It
September 11, 2011	Sarah Wheat, CEO of Planned Parenthood, Austin	Standing up for Planned Parenthood---why healthy Texas women and families matter
August 7, 2011	Brett Buchanan	Beyond The Reach, a look inside the FLDS
July 3, 2011	Nick Lee, President, Atheist Alliance America	The New/Old Atheist Alliance
June 5, 2011	General Membership Meeting	Meeting to discuss the purchase of a building.
May 1, 2011	Election Meeting	ACA Members elect the 2011-2012 board of directors.
April 3, 2011	Åron-Ra	What we can and cannot honestly say we 'know'
March 6, 2011	Jen Peeples	Comfortable Lies About Don’t Ask, Don't Tell
February 6, 2011	The Mormons!	Brian Spears talks about his experience of being steeped in Mormonism and his path out.
January 2, 2011	Don Baker	Mechanisms of Religious Evil
November 7, 2010	Eileen Flynn Delao	Observations: Why the Media Still Fears Atheists, and other observations from a religion writer
October 3, 2010	Steve Bratteng	Dr. Darwin Makes a House Call
September 25, 2010	Matt Dillahunty	The Superiority of Secular Morality
September 12, 2010	Dr. James H. Dee	The Second Wave of Secular Humanism: How Scholarship Undermines Religion
August 1, 2010	Sarah Weis and Brian Spears from Americans United	The Importance of the Separation of Church and State
July 11, 2010	Aime Parsons	Camp Quest Texas, A Journey of the heart for the secular community in Texas
June 6, 2010	Doyle Duke, author	A Critical Analysis of Christianity
May 2, 2010	Election meeting	In lieu of a lecture, we will have an election meeting for the next ACA Board at the Austin History Center.
April 11, 2010	Noelle George	Effective Secular Activism -- Not Just Politics and Protests
March 7, 2010	Kathleen Johnson	A Place at the Table
February 7, 2010	Dr. Jennifer Whitson	The Perception of Patterns in the Noise of Everyday Life
January 3, 2010	Fred Edwords	"Sailing the Rising Tide of Reason"
December 6, 2009	Dr. Jay Banner	Climate change in Texas – A long past and view to the future
November 1, 2009	Don Moore from Final Exit Network	Don Moore talks about the death with dignity movement and the Final Exit Network
October 29, 2009	Dr. Victor J. Stenger	The New Atheism: Taking a Stand for Science and Reason
September 13, 2009	Kathy Miller	Texas SBOE -- Dragging our schools into the culture wars
August 2, 2009	Chris Comer	Standing Up for Science in Texas
July 5, 2009	Panel Discussion	ACA Members will talk on the subject of school vouchers
February 1, 2009	Matt Dillahunty	How to fool the mind
December 7, 2008	Dr. James Dee	The Truth about the Christmas Story
October 5, 2008	Russell Glasser	How atheists can be effective evangelists
September 7, 2008	Oak DeBerg	Are Atheists in the Military the "New" Gay, (or Black or Female)?
August 3, 2008	Matt Dillahunty	Belief
July 6, 2008	Dr. Rory Coker	Pseudoscience, Antiscience and Nonscience!
June 1, 2008	Representative Donna Howard	Religion and the Texas Legislature
May 4, 2008	ACA Board Election Meeting	In lieu of a lecture, we will use the time at the Austin History Center to elect a new board.
April 6, 2008	Charles Jackson, PhD	Climate Prediction: What can or can't we tell about our future - The little-known inner-workings of climate model development
March 2, 2008	James H. Dee, Ph.D.	"Thinking about Religion...and Why it's so Hard" This lecture will discuss some of the obstacles to clear and honest thinking
February 3, 2008	Dicky Grigg	It's Not About Them, It's About Us
January 6, 2008	Don Rhoades	Early Freethought in Texas - The Immigration and Settlement of the "Deutsche Freidenkers" and the Struggle to Preserve Their Sto
December 2, 2007	Movie showing	"The God who wasn't There"
November 4, 2007	Meet the Atheist Longhorns	We'll have several members of the new UT group "Atheist Longhorns" to talk about their group.
October 7, 2007	Membership appreciation meeting	In lieu of a lecture, we'll have a membership appreciation meeting.
September 9, 2007	Mark Loewe	Low cost textbooks, progressive vouchers, and incorrect TAKS scores
August 5, 2007	Matt Dillahunty	Visions of Hell
July 1, 2007	Members of CASA	From advocacy to reason and back again
June 3, 2007	Video Showing and Discussion	Showing of "The Creation Adventure Team: Jurassic Ark Mystery"
April 15, 2007	Lori Lipman Brown, Secular Coalition of America	Protecting Our Freedoms: Taking the Message to Congress
March 4, 2007	Three members of the Travis County Archaeological Society	Three mini-lectures covering human history in Texas and the practice of archeology.
February 4, 2007	UT History Professor Howard Miller	The Atheist Moment: The Sudden and Remarkable Emergence of Public Atheism in George Bush's America
January 7, 2007	Robert "Rock" Howard	Libertarianism: Philosophy, Religion or What?
November 5, 2006	Robin Matthews	Teaching Evolution in Austin
October 22, 2006	Don Baker	The Influence of Religion in the Spanish Conquest of the Americas
August 20, 2006	Jeff Jones, Center for Inquiry	The New Austin CFI Community.
July 23, 2006	Danielle Tierney	The Religious Right's War on Birth Control
June 18, 2006	Thomas Van Orden	Recapping the 10C case and looking to the future of church-state separation
May 21, 2006	Mark Loewe	Muon catalyzed nuclear fusion
March 19, 2006	Matt Dillahunty	The History of the Biblical Canon
February 19, 2006	Dr. Alan Cline	The Disregard of Science and the Responsibility of Citizens
January 15, 2006	Joe Zamecki	A special atheist tour of Inner Space Cavern.
October 16, 2005	DJ Grothe, Center for Inquiry	Arguing for America: Secularism and the Culture Wars
September 18, 2005	Don Baker	Universal Darwinism: How Computer Science has Validated the Theory of Evolution
July 17, 2005	Craig Nazor	The Hartman Prehistoric Garden - a Place for Ancient Plants in a Modern World
April 17, 2005	Deece Eckstein of People for the American Way	Challenges to church-state separation
March 20, 2005	Several ACA Members	A panel discussion on debating theists
February 20, 2005	Heather Alden	Church-state separation and the Texas Freedom Network
January 16, 2005	Joe Zamecki	Tales from the Trenches: A Report on Atheist Activism
November 21, 2004	M. Draper	Darwin and Mendel were clueless: Why we shouldn't teach evolution in schools
October 17, 2004	Dr. Elaine Rich	Our Quest for Machines that Act (and Look) Like Us
August 15, 2004	Shannon Rauh	Texas, Health Education and the Textbook Debates
July 18, 2004	ACLU Attorney Jay Jacobson	A "quick and dirty" guide on the history of the establishment ofreligion clause in the First Amendment - from colonial times to
May 16, 2004	Thomas van Orden
February 16, 2004	Don Baker	Morality and Christianity
December 7, 2003	Dr. Robert (Bob) Solomon	Philosophy, Spirituality, and Atheism
November 2, 2003	Dr. James Dee	The Death of the Afterlife: How Fossils, Embryos, and Brains Falsify Promises of Heaven and Threats of Hell
June 1, 2003	Don Baker	The implications of viewing Christianity as a meme
October 6, 2002	Don Baker	Memes: The New Replicators
July 2, 2000	H. Thompson, R. Florence, J. Dee, J. Koonz, and M. Loewe	Panel discussion on political activism
December 5, 1999	Mark Loewe	Predictions of science

ACA Lecture Series

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