Oak Ridge Today

ORICL winter-spring classes begin Feb. 5

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Submitted

Looking for a way to beat the winter blahs? Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning announces that registration for its winter/spring term will open on January 2, 2018. ORICL is a not-for-profit organization offering a full catalog of classes, field trips, and other activities for area residents of all backgrounds and education levels. All of this is available for as little as $100 for full year of three terms beginning in September, $80 for two terms beginning in February, or $45 for the summer term only. What a bargain for all these opportunities for enlightenment and intellectual stimulation.

Classes are held at the Oak Ridge campus of Roane State Community College. Some meet once a week for several weeks; others are held for only one or two sessions. There are no tests and, in most cases, no homework. This is learning for the fun of it. [Read more…]

ORICL has 20th anniversary celebration Thursday

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Members of an early ORICL board are, standing from left, George Jasny, Janet Evans, and Martha Hobson; sitting from left, Jeannie Cole, Reeva Abraham, Harwell Smith, and Murray Rosenthal, founder and first board president. (Submitted photo)

Members of an early ORICL board are, standing from left, George Jasny, Janet Evans, and Martha Hobson; sitting from left, Jeannie Cole, Reeva Abraham, Harwell Smith, and Murray Rosenthal, founder and first board president. (Submitted photo)

 

In recognition of the 20th anniversary of the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning (ORICL), a celebration will take place on Thursday (September 7) at its home base, the Oak Ridge Branch Campus of Roane State Community College (RSCC).

Tennessee Lieutenant Governor Randy McNally will read a proclamation in honor of ORICL’s 20 years of providing educational experiences for hundreds of retirees in and around Oak Ridge.

RSCC President Chris Whaley will speak on “Lifelong Learning: the Roane State Commitment to ORICL and Oak Ridge.” He will mention Tennessee Reconnects, the state-funded program that will start in fall 2018 to provide a free two-year education to willing adults in Tennessee who have no degrees. [Read more…]

ORICL courses benefit seniors; register by Aug. 7 for fall term

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

ORICL members recently toured Mayfield Dairy. (Submitted photo)

ORICL members recently toured Mayfield Dairy. (Submitted photo)

 

By Carolyn Krause

As traditionalists and baby boomers age, they are looking for ways to be as productive, safe, healthy, and comfortable as possible. This September, the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, which will be celebrating its 20th anniversary, is offering many practical courses for seniors.

Sample topics are caregiving, movement improvement, maximizing the brain-body connection, aging in place, fall prevention, effects of normal aging on driving, and making lifestyle changes, such as downsizing and moving.

At ORICL, you can learn how to write a memoir, operate a computer, invest wisely in the stock market, and do estate planning. [Read more…]

Learn about this summer’s total solar eclipse at ORICL

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Chip Bailey, seen here on the banjo, taught an ORICL course earlier this year on Celtic music in Ireland and Scotland and will teach a course this summer on Celtic music in eastern Canada. He is a teaching artist with the Tennessee Arts Commission. (Submitted photo)

Chip Bailey, seen here on the banjo, taught an ORICL course earlier this year on Celtic music in Ireland and Scotland and will teach a course this summer on Celtic music in eastern Canada. He is a teaching artist with the Tennessee Arts Commission. (Submitted photo)

Would you like to know more about the August 21 total solar eclipse, investing to make your retirement secure, famous Tennessee ladies, Emily Dickinson’s nimble mind, and the inventions of Knoxville’s Weston Fulton (“Edison of the South”)?

Do you have a hankering for learning about and hearing more Celtic music, as discussed and played by Chip Bailey, a teaching artist with the Tennessee Arts Commission?

Want to learn how to travel the world the easy way, write a memoir, crochet creatively, and do visual journaling? How to identify summer birds and butterflies on the Melton Lake Greenway, prepare and cook three Asian dishes, do cryptal varietal crossword puzzles, upgrade a computer, and determine when to replace your PC?

Read Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure” out loud with others? Hear about successful and healthy aging, calories and metabolism and “blue zones,” where people live the longest?

These are among the courses offered during the summer 2017 term of the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, starting June 5 and ending August 4. [Read more…]

Immigrant, refugee rights to be discussed in RSCC-ORICL lecture Thursday

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Kasar Abdulla

Kasar Abdulla

 

Kasar Abdulla, a Muslim refugee from Kurdistan of Iraq and director of advocacy and education at the Nashville nonprofit Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition, will speak at 3 p.m. Thursday, March 30, at the Oak Ridge Branch Campus of Roane State Community College.

Abdulla will tell her story and discuss immigrant and refugee rights in the first talk of 2017 in the RSCC-Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, or ORICL, Lecture Series. Her lecture, which is free and open to the public, will be delivered in the City Room (A-111) of the Coffey-McNally Building.

Abdulla has received awards and recognition on television and in publications for her community activism in Nashville. In 2013, President Barack Obama named her a “Champion of Change” for her work on immigrant integration in Tennessee. [Read more…]

Watch a free showing of movie ‘Psycho’ Oct. 20 at Princess Theatre in Harriman

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Roane State English professor DeAnna Stephens will introduce a free screening of “Psycho,” regarded as Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece of a psychological thriller, at 7 p.m. Oct. 20 in the Princess Theatre in Harriman.

The R-rated film, often described as “creepy,” is the tale of a woman on the lam who checks into the mysterious Bates Motel, apparently vacant except for proprietors Norman Bates and his mother.

The 1960 movie, now considered a classic, gives audiences a whole new perspective on taking showers and became Hitchcock’s biggest hit. [Read more…]

Cuban-U.S. relations the topic of Oct. 31 lecture

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Henry Heredia

Henry Heredia

 

The social, cultural, and environmental development of Cuban society will be the topic of the next lecture in the third annual Roane State Community College–Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning Intergenerational Lecture Series.
Henry Heredia, an international relations specialist from Havana, Cuba, will speak on Monday, October 31, at 4 p.m. in the City Room (A-111) in Roane State’s Coffey-McNally Building on the Oak Ridge Campus at the corner of Briarcliff Avenue and Laboratory Road.

He will also speak on how the perceptions that Cubans and Americans have of each other have changed since President Barack Obama’s announcement in December 2014 that normalized American relations with the island nation. People across the U.S. are curious to know more about Cuba and its people, and some Americans have already visited Cuba, prompting changes in perceptions.

An engaging lecturer who speaks English fluently, Heredia can address many questions Americans have regarding Cuban culture, education, history, and social and environmental policies, a press release said. Since 2013, he has lectured at numerous prestigious institutions in the U.S. [Read more…]

Social media the topic of ORICL fall kickoff at Roane State in Oak Ridge

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Joe Jarret

Joe Jarret (Submitted photo)

 

An expert on legal issues associated with social media will kick off a lecture series sponsored by Roane State Community College and the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, or ORICL.

Joe Jarret’s lecture, titled “Social Media: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” will begin at 3:15 p.m. Thursday, September 15, in the City Room of the Coffey-McNally Building on the Oak Ridge Branch Campus of Roane State Community College. It’s free, and the public is invited. Refreshments will be available in the lobby after Jarret’s talk.

The event in Room A-111 also launches the fall series of courses offered by ORICL, a nonprofit organization that provides a wide variety of classes for area residents who love learning. Those classes start in mid-September, and registration can still be taken during the September 15 event. [Read more…]

Expert on legal issues, social media to speak Sept. 15 at Roane State

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Joe Jarret

Joe Jarret (Submitted photo)

 

An expert on legal issues associated with social media will kick off a lecture series sponsored by the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, or ORICL, and Roane State Community College.

Joe Jarret’s lecture, titled “Social Media: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” will begin at 3:15 p.m. on Thursday, September 15, in the City Room of the Coffey-McNally Building on the Oak Ridge campus of Roane State Community College, which is at 701 Briarcliff Avenue. It’s free, and the public is invited. Refreshments will be available in the lobby after Jarret’s talk.

The event in Room A-111 also launches the fall series of courses offered by ORICL, a nonprofit organization that provides a wide variety of classes for area residents who love learning. Those classes start in mid-September, and registration can still be taken during the September 15 event. [Read more…]

Johnny Majors, standout halfback, winning UT coach, to teach ORICL course

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Johnny Majors

Johnny Majors, standout halfback and winning coach at the University of Tennessee, will teach a course at ORICL. (Submitted photo)

 

Register by Aug. 17 for fall term

Want to feel more relaxed, less fearful, and flexible during this election season? Consider taking courses presented by the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning, or ORICL, on yoga, meditation, and tai chi.

As a Tennessee football fan or coach, would you like to take a course from Johnny Majors, College Football Hall of Fame standout halfback and winning coach at the University of Tennessee? He will tell about his life and the secrets of coaching to win.

Would you like to know more about driverless cars, Mozart, the Vikings, Russian fairy tales, Chinese diagnosis in medicine, and who should have power and why?

Learn about Indonesia, Myanmar, and Thailand? Explore supernatural phenomena, mitochondria, research at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Spallation Neutron Source in Oak Ridge, and the God question. [Read more…]

Register for ORICL courses, trips by May 11; term starts June 6

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

ORICL Trip to Distillery

ORICL members stop at Prichard’s Distillery on one of their bus tours around a part of Tennessee. (Submitted photo)

 

Want to learn how to improve your home so you’ll get a significant return on your investment when you sell it? How to lose weight by better understanding and managing calories and metabolism? How to treat painsl and disorders in the neck, shoulders, back, wrists, hands and feet?

Would you like to know more about modern techniques in psychotherapy, the history of India, America’s first professional songwriter Stephen Foster, the history of spying in the U.S., and evidence that human-induced climate change is really happening?

Are you interested in courses on topics such as archaeology that provides a glimpse of prehistoric Native American life in Tennessee, Native American religion and culture, the effects of growing cities on the environment, and the story of American novelist Harper Lee and her influential book “To Kill a Mockingbird”?

These are among the courses offered during the summer 2016 term of the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning (ORICL), starting June 6 and ending August 5. All courses offer excellent lectures and thought-provoking discussions but have no homework or tests. [Read more…]

Roane State professor to discuss his Pluto flyby involvement

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Ted Stryk, ORICL lecturer

Ted Stryk

In July 2015, the world learned about the flyby of Pluto and its moons by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft.

Ted Stryk, associate professor of philosophy and English at Roane State Community College, is participating in the geology and geophysics investigation of Pluto and its moons for the New Horizons team.

He will discuss the latest findings and the story behind his involvement in probing the dwarf planet and its satellites as the next presenter in the Roane State–Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning Intergenerational Lecture Series. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Stryk will deliver his talk at 3 p.m. Wednesday, April 27, in the City Room, A-111, in the Coffey-McNally Building at Roane State Community College’s Oak Ridge Branch Campus on Briarcliff Avenue.

“The Pluto flyby occurred 50 years to the day after the first planet, Mars, was imaged close up by Mariner 4,” Stryk said. “The flyby marks the completion of the initial reconnaissance of our solar system as we saw it on the eve of the space age. [Read more…]