TORCH RADIO
Preparing for Thoughtful Leadership
Philip A. Glotzbach spent nearly two decades shaping Skidmore College into a campus where curiosity was not merely encouraged but built into the architecture of daily life. As the institution’s seventh president, he carried forward Josephine Young Case’s vision of an education that fosters both intellectual freedom and moral horizon. Though he stepped down in 2017, Glotzbach’s influence endures—in the culture of the college and in the questions he continues to pursue about the purpose of liberal education in a changing world.
In Embrace Your Freedom: Winning Strategies for Success in College and Life, Glotzbach distills a lifetime in higher education into a clear argument: success depends less on raw talent than on the habits students build. He urges readers to treat college as a laboratory for curiosity, time management, relationships, and reflective judgment, emphasizing that engagement—seeking mentors, asking questions, and embracing intellectual risk—is the engine of meaningful learning.
More than a guide to academic achievement, the book is a meditation on character and purpose. Glotzbach challenges students to think not only about what they will do, but who they will become, linking education to responsibility, service, and thoughtful citizenship. The result is both a practical handbook and a quiet manifesto for intentional living—an invitation to approach college, and life itself, as an ongoing project of growth.
Smartacus Wonders:
1. Why did you write this book? What do you hope your readers will get from it?
2. What concerns you most about the future for young people?
3. How should young people and their parents be making the cost/benefit analysis with the spectre of AI hanging over all of us?
4. If a parent asks, “What should college actually do for my child?” what’s your 30-second elevator speech?
5. What is the most important question an eighteen-year-old should ask about college that almost no one tells them to ask?
Thanks to the Smartacus Story Accelerator