In achievement and prestige, the University of Wisconsin–Madison has long been recognized as one of America's great universities. A public, land-grant institution, UW–Madison offers a complete spectrum of liberal arts studies, professional programs and student activities. Many of its programs are hailed as world leaders in instruction, research and public service.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeEnergy consumption and its consequences have spurred some of the most important public debates of our time. We are presently confronted by an unprecedented paradox: the negative consequences of fossil fuel combustion have never been clearer, but oil and gas extraction are experiencing a technological revolution. How long with fossil fuel supplies last? What are the long-term implications of fracking and other technologies that extend their use? At what point will renewable energy systems replace fossil fuels altogether? Such questions have a direct impact on our health, wealth, and security, but reliable answers are scarce. In this class we will develop a unique, “big picture” perspective on these issues, based on the concept that all energy systems, fossil and renewable, depend on finite geologic resources of the Earth. Armed with this perspective, energy consumers, producers, and policy makers can make more informed choices for the future. This course will emphasize three universal principles: Energy quality matters more than quantity, Technological advances continually redefine reality, and All energy systems carry their own negative consequences. We will explore energy options ranging from solar to nuclear, revealing how the above principles apply to each.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeNOTE: This course is no longer available on Coursera. But the videos of the course have been uploaded by the instructor on Youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upRFk2b2vas&list=PL3aUlTZucB4GoRkOoVgVIbbN7JqrXioFQ This course covers our evolutionary history across more than seven million years, from our origins among the apes up to the biological changes that are still unfolding today. If you enroll, you'll encounter the evidence for the earliest members of our lineage, as they begin the long pathway to humanity. You'll see how scientists are learning about the diets of ancient people, using microscopic evidence and chemical signatures in ancient teeth. We will explore together the exciting fossil discoveries of the last ten years, which have shaken up our notions of the origin of human culture and our own genus. Genomics has fundamentally transformed the way we understand our evolution, in many ways opening the direct evidence of our history to anyone. The course will teach you how to look inside the genomes of humans, Neandertals and other ancient people. If you have used personal genomics to get your own genotypes, the course will guide you in connecting genetics to your ancestry among ancient humans.The course brings a special focus on the rapid evolutionary changes of the last 10,000 years. You'll learn about the consequences of our shift to agriculture, and the ways that people of industrialized nations are still changing today. At the end, we trek forward to anticipate what evolutionary changes may be in store for humanity in the future, using our knowledge of history and scientific understanding to inform our speculations.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeThis 4-week course will feature a new season each week through short lectures and activities covering Great Lakes weather, observed changes in the climate, and societal impacts of climate change. Learn how the mid-latitude location of the Great Lakes Region and the influence of five massive and stunning fresh-water lakes combine to create exhilarating weather systems each season. Winters are cold and snowy; spring brings thunderstorms, heavy rains and tornadoes; summers are hot and humid and the transition to autumn paves the way for especially windy storms like the one that sunk the Edmund Fitzgerald (a massive iron ore freighter that sank in Lake Superior in 1975). On top of all this, climate change is adding to the complexity. Numerous observations demonstrate that the climate of the Great Lakes Region is changing. Average temperatures are getting warmer and extreme heat events are occurring more frequently. Total precipitation is increasing and heavy precipitation events are becoming more common. Winters are getting shorter and duration of lake ice cover is decreasing. We’ll share the data with you before focusing on people and communities adjusting to these changes. And to slow the rate of future climate change, we’ll share actions you can take that benefit you and everyone who loves the weather and climate of the Great Lakes Region.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeShakespeare in Community begins as a Massive Open Online Course but it is also a massive public digital humanities event. The course will introduce a broad audience of learners to Shakespeare, as we collectively read, watch, and engage four Shakespeare plays: Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Much Ado About Nothing, and The Tempest.Shakespeare’s Hamlet begins with the curious and provocative line, “Who’s there?,” and these are the words that will begin our course. The line is both a literal question to the audience and a deeper question about what it means to be human. The question takes on a different set of potential meanings when it is read on the screen of a computer, iPad, smart phone, or within a MOOC, asking contemporary readers of Shakespeare to consider how their humanity is changing in the face of rapid technological changes. The goal of this Shakespeare in Community course, then, will be to discover Shakespeare while also considering together what it is for us to discover and un-cover Shakespeare in the digital age.Ultimately, this course will be focused on building a global community around the study of Shakespeare. And so one of our central goals will be to use Shakespeare’s plays as an occasion for creating important conversations that bridge cultures, languages, and geographies. Students in the course will also increase their digital literacies, learning new tools for reading, writing, critical analysis, and collaboration. The course will be both about Shakespeare and also about the digital humanities, encouraging learners to think critically about how digital tools (including MOOCs) can be used to investigate literary texts.While the primary instructors have 60+ years of experience teaching Shakespeare among us, we will not be serving as talking head “experts” in this course. Rather, the course will bring together a broad range of experts at UW-Madison, within the Madison theater communities, from the Folger Shakespeare Library, and around the world. Launching each week of the course will be a series of short documentaries, but the heart of the course will be the community we build among the participants. Our goal is not to teach you what we know about Shakespeare, but to help each of you find your Shakespeare.Some stuff you can do right now to get started: Follow @hackshakespeare on Twitter. Join our Facebook group. Watch the second preview.And browse the YouTube Playlist with all the videos produced for the MOOC.Finally, the instructors will be gathering together with some participants from the course and also some new friends for an educational travel experience in Spring Green, WI in September of 2015. Click here for more details about the Shakesperience Weekend.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeA thing is right when it tends to preservethe integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong whenit tends otherwise.Aldo LeopoldA Sand County Almanac,1949Hunting has been a core conservation management tool in the United States since its founding. Indeed, "perceptive hunters" believe hunting should contribute to conservation rather than hinder it. As conservation science has improved, so have calls for understanding the role of game species in ecosystems, as well as in regional politics and economics. Deer, pheasant and elk are cultural icons because of their value to hunters, and are also a source of persistent controversy because of their role in complex ecological and economic systems.Aldo Leopold, author of A Sand County Almanac, accepted a chair in game management atthe University of Wisconsin and published a textbook in 1933 marking theemergence of wildlife conservation as a professional discipline. The scientificand ethical foundations laid down by Leopold fostered the emergence of a uniquemodel for wildlife conservation in North America.This course will provide students with an understanding of the historical legacy of wildlife management and recreationalhunting as a part of conservation, the role of wildlife in ecosystems, theimportance of ethics in guiding management decisions and hunter choices, andthe politics and economics of controversies surrounding game and non-gamemanagement, hunting, and conservation. We will also look at the emerging face of hunting today, and contemporary models of conservation. The content draws on the expertise andexperience of scholars, researchers, managers, and citizens in the overlappingspheres of applied ecology, policy, environmental and natural resourcemanagement.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeClimate change ishaving and will continue to have a dramatic impact on global public health –from natural disasters and the increased spread of infectious disease topredicted crop losses and heat waves. This course explores the impact of human activities on climate changeand consequently public health, as well as the many real benefits to climatechange mitigation. We will discover the multiple benefits – or co-benefits – provided by publicpolicies and initiatives to reduce emissions. For example, protecting the environment by reducing greenhousegases can simultaneously improve human health.In addition to providing evidence for climate change’s impact on humanhealth, this course will explore three primary areas where co-benefits can be realized: renewable energy, agriculture andfood, urban design and active transport. Please note: use of the term “urban”is relative; traits traditionally understood as “urban” can exist in manyplaces, even if populations are not large.This course will feature input from experts across the globe.Participants will have the opportunity to engage with the current scientificand political literature, and discuss course content with peers worldwide. Course participants will be given a strong foundation in the corelinkages between climate change, policy, and health. There will also behands-on opportunities to develop skills in communicating the science andpolicy connections between climate change and public health.The course will emphasize a way forward for all, one providing the mostbeneficial effects on both human health and the environment.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeVideo games are one of the fastest trending topics in media, education, and technology. Research across fields as disparate as science, literacy, history, visual processing, curriculum, and computer science suggests that video games aren’t just fun –they can actually be good for your mind as well. In this course, we will discuss current research on the kinds of thinking and learning that go into video games and gaming culture. We’ll investigate the intellectual side of digital gameplay, coveringtopics that range from perception and attention in Left 4 Dead 2 to the development of historical understanding in Civilization to collaborative learning in massively multiplayer online games like World of Warcraft. Throughout the course, we examine theinherent tensions between contemporary youth culture and traditional education and new developments in games for learning that promise to help bridge that growing divide.If you do have questions about the course itself, please direct your inquiries to vglcoursera@gmail.com.Data from this course is being used for quality assurance and for educational research purposes. All data from minors will be excluded from use in educational research purposes. See Coursera’s Terms of Use for a description of the data captured from courseactivity. Please contact outreach@learninggamesnetwork.org with any questions or concerns. If you do not wish to have your data from this course used for educational research purposes, you may dis-enroll from this course.
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeThe classical economic theory of markets cannot account for some importantissues, such as the coexistence of unemployment and vacancies; credit marketrationing; or bubbles in asset prices. This course will exploremarkets with frictions, shedding light on these issues and other fundamentalquestions such as: What is a bank, and why do we use money?
Class Central TipsLearn How to Sign up to Coursera courses for free1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely FreeDid you know that thousands of people could have been saved during the 2009 tsunami if mangrove forests had been protected… and that the boreal forest holds 40% of the Earth’s soil carbon… and that only 7% of forests are “rain forest,” but this biome holds 50% of the world’s species? Did you hear that big cities like New York and Quito are mandating forest protection to save their city's water supply? This is only a handful of the questions you’ll find answers to in this Forests and Humans online course. This course provides an overview of the geography, ecology, and economic importance of the world’s forest biomes. You’ll learn how climate influences vegetation and, in-turn, how forests impact global climate. You’ll meet scientists working to understand the astounding biodiversity and ecological complexity of forest ecosystems, and how these ecosystems support human life. We’ll discuss the threats to forest ecosystems around the world, and hear from the people trying to protect them. The course emphasizes the forest resources and services that humans depend upon, and how we can maintain these resources into the future. We’ll analyze the idea of “sustainability” when it comes to forest management, hear alternative viewpoints about what this word means, and discuss potential conflicts. Finally, we’ll take a look at the many real-world programs in place at the global, national, and local level to sustainably manage forests.