Tuesday Session 2   

This class will take participants on a journey of the history of the major watersheds (the Allegheny, Monongahela, Beaver, and main-stem Ohio River) that comprise the Upper Ohio River Basin surrounding Pittsburgh. This journey will begin with how glaciers defined our major river system, followed by discussions of the major historical floods and droughts, the development of the regional navigation system, the multi-purpose reservoir system, and local channel improvement projects network.

As what became one of the first public art collections following the French Revolution and the most visited art museums in the world, the Louvre has both a storied history and an incredible art collection. This course provides an overview of the history of the museum and how it came to be and focuses on some of its most renowned works of art. Some highlights include the history of the French Academy, the Nike of Samothrace and Venus de Milo, the Oath of the Horatii and the Raft of the Medusa, and, of course, the Mona Lisa.

This course is tailored for audiences who are curious about artificial intelligence (AI). The topics that will be covered include a brief history of AI and how it affects modern life, the fundamental concepts of AI (supervised/unsupervised/semi-supervised learning, deep learning, generative models like ChatGPT), a few applications of AI (healthcare, autonomous driving, security and surveillance), together with the downsides and some of the ethical concerns surrounding AI. The concepts will be taught at a high level without delving too much into the mathematical details, and participants do not need to have a strong technical background to grasp the concepts.

This course covers the general ideas behind the Big Bang and the expansion of the universe. The course is for non-experts, and accurate descriptions will keep jargon and mathematics to a minimum. Some historical background for the discovery that the universe began about 13.8 billion years ago will be presented, followed by the evolution of the universe to the present time. Discoveries made in cosmology in the last half century rank with the greatest intellectual achievements in all of history. Despite the profound, underlying complexity, students should be able to gain a reasonable grasp of these majestic ideas.

Album covers are much more than just packaging. An album cover design can be as much a part of the identity of a record as its sound. This course will explore the history of album cover design from its beginning in the 1930s through the cool jazz of the 50s; rock and roll and psychedelia in the 60s; the golden age of the album cover in the 70s; the rise of Punk, New Wave, and Hip Hop in the 80s; to the demise of vinyl records in the 90s and the rise of digital art today. We’ll listen to some of the music while we examine some of the great album cover artists and photographers.

What better time than midsummer to watch and discuss some movies about baseball? For decades, American filmmakers have made movies that have both celebrated the game and used it to comment on the workings of race, gender, region, and money in our culture. We will screen and talk about one baseball movie each week, along with some clips from related films. Our viewing list will likely include Eight Men Out, A League of Their Own, Bang the Drum Slowly, Sugar, and Moneyball. These films offer insights into sports, society, and the art of film.

This course is designed to develop the participants' awareness of the actor’s process and a general sense of theatre as an area of human endeavor. Participants will be introduced to basic theater terminology, communication skills, including physical and vocal presence in front of an audience. The course will also develop an introductory level of acting skill through regular warm-ups, theatre games, improvisation, and simple scene study.

Three pillars support the U.S. government as well as its society: civil affairs; military affairs, and the American people. They are separate and independent entities but also unified and interdependent entities. The result is a delicate, shared balance of power, with the American people serving as its fulcrum. Finding and maintaining that proper balance between military capabilities and civilian control of our armed forces, therefore, is an essential and necessary task that underscores the importance and relevance of good governance. The course will focus primarily on foundations and theories of civil-military relations, basics of national security, and an overview of the military establishment.