STEMM   

Join a Great River Greening Ecologist (and staff) for a hands-on introduction to Minnesota’s native prairies. Learn about local restoration efforts, then head into the fields to hand-harvest native grass and wildflower seeds that help restore vital habitat. Held at Lake Elmo Park Reserve, with support from Washington County staff, this fall workshop combines ecology, stewardship, and outdoor exploration during peak seed season. This course requires walking off-trail across uneven terrain.

Have you noticed all the recent news stories about decades old cold case homicides getting solved? This course will explain how law enforcement is combining cutting-edge DNA technology with traditional genealogy family tree building to solve some of the oldest and most prolific cold cases.

Discover how, for the health of all of us, American medicine must shift from reactive "healthcare" to proactive health. We’ll first explore the critical need for primary care alongside game-changing innovations like AI and groundbreaking GLP-1 therapies. We'll uncover the hopeful science of epigenetics. You'll learn how everyday choices—sleep, movement, connection, and purpose—act as powerful levers to extend your health span through the epigenetic influences of your daily life decisions on the expression of “good” and “bad genes.”  

Recommended reading: The Great Healthcare Disruption by Dr, Marschall Runge,  Forbes Books, 2025.

When we think of animals that provide the greatest insights into animal cognition and behavior, primates and honeybees come to mind, or perhaps whales or octopuses. What about the raccoons that plunder our rubbish at night, or the coyotes that threaten pets and livestock, or the gulls that divebomb for snacks at the beach? Based on Marlene Zuk’s new book, Outsider Animals, this talk challenges everything you thought you knew about the overlooked animals that live in proximity to humans, sharing the stories that each has to tell about adaptation and cohabitation on our increasingly crowded planet.

Recommended reading: Outsider Animals by Marlene Zuk, Princeton University Press, 2026.

The 3-minute Thesis Competition challenges graduate students to communicate the significance of their dissertation research in just three minutes, with the aid of a single, static slide. The first session of this course will discuss the history of the nation-wide competition, judging, and how students prepare with Assistant Vice Provost Noro Andriamanalina and Itoro Watt, winner of the 2025 University-wide competition. For the second session, OLLI members will attend the 3-Minute Thesis Competition on the University of Minnesota campus followed by lunch. An optional third session on Zoom will invite participants to discuss their experience at the competition afterwards. 

Carbon dioxide is an integral component of life on Earth whose rising atmospheric concentrations have been one of the biggest contributors to rising temperatures in recent decades. To aid in climate change mitigation strategies and to tap into an abundant source of carbon, scientists have been researching the production of chemicals, pharmaceuticals, fuels, and materials from carbon dioxide captured from the air. This course introduces concepts of environmental science, chemistry, and scientific inquiry and collaboration in the context of scientists’ efforts to leverage carbon dioxide usage.

Recommended reading: The Story of CO2 Is the Story of Everything: How Carbon Dioxide Made Our World – A Natural History of Climate and the Future of Life by Peter Brannen, Ecco, 2025; The Story of CO2: Big Ideas for a Small Molecule by Geoffrey Ozin and Mireille Ghossoub, Aevo UTP, 2020.