Would you like to sing songs with a nature theme along with a folk duo and learn the history of the blues and of different styles of organ music? Do you know what challenges the youth in our community are facing and what resources are available to help them? What are the keys to achieving better mental health?
What does the Oak Ridge city manager have to say about the city’s government and projects? Would you like to learn more about charitable estate planning? What are some fascinating facts about groundwater and the makeup of continents?
Jennifer Davis shows a smart bulb in the ORICL course she taught in 2024 on smart homes. She also taught a class on identity theft and cyberfraud.
Are you eager to learn more about cooking, gardening, taking nature photographs or researching your family’s story over the generations?
You can learn answers, skills and so much more by registering for and taking a selection of more than 75 courses offered by the Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning (ORICL) during the winter-spring term, which runs from Feb. 3 through April 25.
Most of ORICL’s mind-stimulating offerings this winter and spring will be held at the Oak Ridge Branch Campus of Roane State Community College (RSCC), 701 Briarcliff Ave. However, a few classes will be given by Zoom only or take place at the First United Methodist Church.
You can journey into the past by taking classes on Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-75); William Blount, Tennessee’s “founding scoundrel”; the history of American thought and of Scotland and the Scots-Irish; the French Revolution and Russian Revolution; the “American Experience,” according to Ken Burns; the Lewis and Clark Expedition; the American women who raised money to build an ironclad warship for the Confederate Navy; courage and cowardice in the American Civil War, and stories from the Secret City.
In the literature category, courses are offered on writing, studies of the novel and the traditional ballad and readings of plays by Shakespeare. ORICL is also hosting a special presentation by Oak Ridge poet laureates, Rose Weaver and Lillian Shafer.
Online registration for the winter-spring term opened on Dec. 3. To register for the remaining two terms and become an annual member, the membership fee is $130 per registrant, payable online or by check to ORICL. The cost of ORICL classes is a bargain compared with the fees for many other lifelong learning programs in the United States, according to several ORICL board members.
Visit www.roanestate.edu/oricl to see the online catalog and register for courses on a variety of subjects. For more information and a paper catalog, email the ORICL office at oricl@roanestate.edu or visit the ORICL office in Room F-111 in RSCC’s Coffey-McNally Building. The office is open from 9 a.m. to noon, Monday through Thursday, when the RSCC Oak Ridge campus is open.
Each course consists of one class or a series of weekly classes, each 70 minutes long. Most classes are in person, but a few are Zoom only.
Languages that will be taught include Latin, Russian and Ukrainian.
The religion classes include ways to speak about God theologically (hybrid), ways to live with antisemitism and a history of the Jewish people (part two). Another class is concluding the study of the “Echoes from the Holocaust” memoir of Oak Ridge Holocaust survivor Mira Kimmelman.
You can join a book group and read and discuss classic literature, mystery novels, other fiction, nonfiction, speculative fiction or technical books. Most of the book classes are on Zoom.
There is a class on the Scarboro 85 monument project honoring Oak Ridge’s Black students who desegregated two city schools. A course on “The Forgotten History of America’s Original Inhabitants” will describe the medicines created by the Native Americans and their spiritual commitment to protecting the environment.
Other classes will help you improve your mental agility (Cryptic Varietal Crossword Puzzles), conversation skills (Crochet and Conversation) and feelings of goodwill (Lovingkindness and Unbounded Friendliness). The Friday Lecture course will feature a variety of speakers from the University of Tennessee, Oak Ridge National Laboratory and other local institutions and organizations.
This article originally appeared on Oakridger: Mind-stimulating, lifelong learning classes in Oak Ridge start Feb. 3