by Claire L. Brady

There are places you expect to enjoy, and then there are places that stay with you long after you've left.

That was our experience visiting the Obama Presidential Center during our recent family trip to Chicago. I knew the visit would be meaningful, but I wasn't prepared for how emotional it would feel to experience it alongside three generations of our family. Watching my 76-year old mother-in-law, my 45 year old husband, our 15 year old son, and I move through the exhibits reminded me that learning isn't simply an individual experience. It is something we share, question, and carry forward together.

As we moved through the Center, I was reminded that meaningful learning is rarely a solitary experience. Four people from three generations walked through the same exhibits, yet each of us noticed different details, asked different questions, and drew different connections. Somewhere between the stories on the walls and the conversations we had with one another, the experience became something much larger than a museum visit. I found myself seeing it through two lenses at once—first as an immigrant who has always appreciated the promise of this country, and second as an educator who couldn't help but notice how intentionally the Center teaches, challenges, and inspires.

What struck me most was that the Center doesn't ask visitors to memorize history. It invites them to engage with it. Throughout the exhibits, you're encouraged to wrestle with complex questions about leadership, citizenship, service, community, and possibility. Rather than presenting simple answers, it creates space for reflection and conversation.

As I watched our family stop, talk, ask questions, and occasionally wipe away tears, I realized that we weren't just visiting a presidential center. We were participating in exactly the kind of learning experience that higher ed hopes to create every day.

Too often, we reduce education to content delivery. We measure what students know while giving less attention to how they are changing. Yet some of the most meaningful learning happens when an experience challenges our assumptions, broadens our perspective, or helps us see ourselves differently. Those moments don't always happen inside a classroom. Sometimes they happen in museums, on study abroad trips, in a student leadership role, group project, during service experiences, or simply while walking through an exhibit with people who bring different life experiences than our own.

That may be one of the greatest gifts educators can give our students—not answers, but experiences worth reflecting on.

The visit also reminded me that leadership is ultimately about legacy. Every educator leaves one. Every staff and faculty member leaves one. Every institution leaves one. Long after policies are rewritten and strategic plans are archived, what people remember is how leaders made them feel, what they inspired others to believe was possible, and whether they invited people into something larger than themselves.

Perhaps that's why the visit resonated so deeply with me.

In my work, I spend a great deal of time helping colleges and universities prepare for the future, particularly as AI reshapes teaching, learning, and leadership. But standing in the Obama Presidential Center was a powerful reminder that while technology may change how we learn, it should never change why we learn. Education has always been about helping people understand themselves, understand one another, and imagine a future worth building. That's difficult to measure on a dashboard. But it's the work that matters most.

I walked into the Center expecting to learn more about President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. I walked out thinking much more about my own life and impact. That's because the Center isn't really about celebrating one presidency. It's about celebrating possibility. It reminds us that history isn't something that simply happens to us; it's something each of us helps shape through the choices we make, the communities we build, and the people we serve.

In that sense, it's one of the most hopeful places I've visited in a very long time.

If you ever have the opportunity to visit the Obama Presidential Center, please go. Not because you'll leave with all the answers, but because you'll leave with better questions. You'll reflect on leadership differently. You'll think about service differently. And if your experience is anything like ours, you'll leave with a renewed appreciation for the power of education—not simply to inform us about the past, but to inspire us to help shape the future.

Enjoy a few photos, from the many, that we took while on campus!