Dr. 亚瑟·奥尔森, professor emeritus of philosophy 和 宗教 和 former provost, served at Augustana for more than 40 years.
Olsen earned an undergraduate degree from St. 奥拉夫学院, a bachelor's degree in theology from Luther Theological Seminary 和 a doctorate in theology from Harvard Divinity School. He later served as a visiting scholar at both Harvard 和 Stanford Universities.
他第一次加入奥古斯塔是在1956年. While pursuing his doctoral studies at Harvard, he took a part-time position teaching speech at MIT from 1957-60. He then re-joined Augustana 和 served until his retirement in 1996.
Appointed by former Augustana President Dr. 比尔·尼尔森, Olsen served as Augustana's first Chair of Religion 和 值 (later named the Stanley L. Olsen Chair of Moral 值) from 1985-90 — a position made possible thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. 同时, Olsen assumed the post of chief coordinator/implementer of Augustana's general 教育 curriculum, as the new curriculum moved toward implementation.
他是挪威移民的儿子, Olsen served as a champion for sharing the Norwegian culture 和 herit年龄, organizing Norwegian langu年龄 camps for children on campus, founding the annual Nordl和 Festival in 1975 和 preserving Herit年龄 Park — a collection of historic Great Plains buildings dating from the late 19th to early 20th century, 位于校园内.
Olsen was particularly active in developing 和 teaching courses related to questions of value. 他曾担任Capstone的董事, encouraging 和 supporting the development of Capstone courses as part of Augustana's General Education, 和 chaired the committee that helped define the university's five core values: Christian, 文科, 卓越, 社区及服务.
奥尔森于2014年5月去世.
In 2015, the Olsen family made an endowed gift to support the Augustana Symposium 和 student research. In honor of that gift 和 in tribute to Olsen's many contributions to the campus community 和 student research, the Augustana Symposium was renamed the 阿瑟·奥尔森 Student Research Symposium.