OLLI@DU / 2023 FALL / COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

Current Events I

PACE 1002

Tuesday

Dates: 9/19 to 11/7 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitators: Richard Reinish/Sydney Myers, Platinum Facilitators

Location: 1st Universalist

Class Limit: 32 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Central

We will discuss the prior weeks’ news in the first hour. In the second hour a topic that’s current will be determined by the facilitators and articles will be sent out for that discussion.

Current Events II

PACE 1009

Wednesday

Dates: 9/20 to 11/8 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitators: Richard Reinish/Sydney Myers, Platinum Facilitators

Location: 1st Universalist

Class Limit: 32 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Central

We will discuss the prior weeks’ news in the first hour. In the second hour a topic that’s current will be determined by the facilitators and articles will be sent out for that discussion.

Current Events III

PACE 1014

Thursday

Dates: 9/21 to 11/9 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitator: Terry Casey

Location: 1st Universalist

Class Limit: 20 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Central

This will be a current affairs course where class content will be about major topical current affairslocal, national, and international-with reading suggested by and sent out by facilitator each week. While the subject list will depend on issues currently topical, facilitator proposes balancing these between issues important in Colorado/ Denver, nationally and internationally. Examples of each might be initiated state constitutional/ statutory amendments in the upcoming November election; national issues such as free speech, gun control efforts, tax policy; global warming, international tension/wars.

First Amendment: Religious Liberty

PACE 1019

Thursday

Dates: 9/21 to 11/9 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitator: Marcus Pohlmann

Location: Online Class Limit: 25 Participants

Sponsoring Site: South

The course will allow the class to critically discuss how the United States Supreme Court has come to interpret the first amendment’s free exercise and establishment of religion clauses. Among the specific controversies discussed will be school prayer, creation science, religious displays, and gay wedding cakes.

From a Militarized to a Decarbonized Economy PACE 1012

Wednesday

Dates: 9/20 to 10/25 (6 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitators: Chris Evans-Klock/Miriam

Pemberton

Location: Online

Class Limit: 40 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Central

The U.S. military budget exceeds the military spending of the next 10 countries put together. It is higher now, in inflation-adjusted terms, than it ever was during the Cold War. Hundreds of communities across the country are woven into the warfare economy by hosting bases, weapons labs, and defense production sites. In addition to an overview of the U.S. military economy as a whole, this course looks at the experience of a handful of these communities whose economies and jobs are dependent on defense spending. Their stories relate how they have influenced military budgets and perpetuated specific weapon programs, but also how some have attempted to convert to other kinds of economic activities. In particular, since as the US Military has said, climate change is now “an urgent and growing threat to national security,” we will look at how redirecting our militarized foreign and industrial policy toward climate security can help these communities become part of the solution. The course puts these local concerns into some multinational context, linking the challenges and opportunities of the transition from a militarized to a decarbonized economy to U.S. commitments through the United Nations on such issues as climate change, peacekeeping, disarmament, arms control, and refugees.

Recommended book: Six Stops on the National Security Tour; Rethinking Warfare Economics, by Miriam Pemberton, Routledge Press, 2023

Gen Z (Born 1995–2012): Super-Connected, OverProtected, Socially and Morally Hypersensitive PACE 1013

Wednesday

Dates: 9/20 to 11/8 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitators: Barbara Holme, Senior Facilitator/ Steve Winber, Master Facilitator

Location: Online Class Limit: Unlimited

Sponsoring Site: Central

This course, based on the book The Coddling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, will explore the consequences and challenges to our present and future society of “safetyism” – the overprotecting and shielding of students from discomfort and differing opinions. Coupled with the effects of social media and the social disruptions due to Covid, the result is a less happy, more risk-averse, hypersensitive generation unprepared for adulthood. We will also discuss possible solutions. Each week you will receive news articles relevant to our topic.