ABOUT PHYLLIS 

Phyllis Moen is a life course scholar investigating the timing, duration and sequencing of work, family, and retirement pathways in tandem with the health and well-being of women and men of different ages, life stages, and social locations. During her 25 years at Cornell University she was the Ferris Family Professor of Life Course Studies and founding director of the Bronfenbrenner Center. She also served on the board of Civic Ventures, the precursor to Encore.org. Now at the University of Minnesota, Dr. Moen directs the Life Course Center, holds a McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair, and is a professor of Sociology.

Dr. Moen’s many books and articles address the mismatch between outdated 20th century clocks and calendars around education, work and safety-nets and 21st century demographic, economic, technological, and family transformations. These mismatches represent both institutional lag and a failure of imagination in addressing the challenges of our times, leading to multilayered (by gender, class, and race in combination with age) disparities in social engagement, opportunities, resources, and risks for individuals and untapped time, talent, and creativity within communities and societies.

Moen’s latest award-winning book, Encore Adulthood: Boomers on the Edge of Risk, Renewal, and Purpose (2016), emphasizes the possibilities as well as inequalities in this new life stage. She encourages policy-makers, organizations, and communities to recognize and respond to both the promise and vulnerabilities of this historically unprecedented space opening up after the conventional years of family- and career-building but prior to postponed (as a result of medical advances and life-style changes) fragilities associated with conventional old age.

To address the need for institutional innovation and new roadmaps, Dr. Moen launched the University of Minnesota Advanced Careers Initiative (UMAC), bringing Boomers and others back to campus to explore their next acts by widening horizons, reimagining identities, intergenerational learning, and hands-on participation in community organizations. UMAC illustrates how public universities can serve as catalysts promoting life-long intergenerational education and purposive encores for the greater good.