News Junkies Unite! Discussing the Headlines of the Day
**This course meets THREE weeks in December**
Each week brings a vast array of important and complex political and social developments.
Analysis and coverage by print, social, and mass media sometimes clarify but often obscure what is really going on and why. It is hard to navigate through this maze.
For the first time OLLI is offering a three-week facilitated discussion of the most important issues facing us as citizens. The goal is to select the most critical topic(s) in each of the above weeks and to discuss these in-depth. For example, if the course were being held this week the selected topic might well be gun violence in the United States.
The facilitators will lead a discussion on:
? What are the drivers that make the United States unique among developed countries with regard to the level of gun violence?
? How large a role do political leaders play in influencing one way or another the root causes of this violence?
? What can we as citizens do?
Participants will be expected to be up on the latest major issues covered by the media and need to submit their choice of topics to the facilitators three days before each meeting, naming up to three topics in order of preference. The facilitators will work with the results of these selections to select one topic and a backup (if we exhaust the discussion) in order to develop discussion questions.
There are two ground rules:
1. Any topic may be suggested.
2. In the discussions, all opinions need to be respected; while we may and should disagree, we must not become disagreeable!
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