Continuing Studies has educational cure for summertime blues: 5/03

NEWS RELEASE

5/13/03

Melissa (Maggie) Gallup, marketing and special events coordinator, Continuing Studies Program: (650) 723-7957, magallup@stanford.edu
John Sanford, News Service: (650) 736-2151; jsanford@stanford.edu

Relevant Web URLs:
http://continuingstudies.stanford.edu

Continuing Studies has educational cure for summertime blues

Registration for more than 60 courses, workshops, symposia and seminars offered this summer through Continuing Studies begins at 8:30 a.m. Monday, May 19. Instruction begins June 23.

From Urban Life in the Ancient World to Fashion and Modern Identity, courses cover a wide variety of subjects, including art, business, history, political science, creative writing, drama, personal development, health, foreign languages, literature, music, cultural studies, philosophy, science and information technology.

University employees who work half time or more may use their Staff Training Assistance Program (STAP) funds to pay tuition and registration fees. All offerings are open to the public.

Students can study great works of the creative imagination in courses such as Icons of Modern Art, The Comedies of Shakespeare and Joyce's Ulysses, or examine the life and work of such cultural and historical figures as British statesman Winston Churchill and American composer Charles Ives. Courses such as Global Ethics and Medical Advances in Genetics explore trends in the social and biological sciences, while Tools for Strategic Management and Marketing the Intangible: Services Marketing aim to help students get ahead in business. Belletrists may want to indulge their muses by enrolling in one of the program's several creative writing courses.

Continuing Studies also offers a number of weekend workshops on topics that range from acting to business strategy. A special field course, Natural History and Marine Biology, will take place over two consecutive Saturdays and give students a chance to view research and conservation efforts being undertaken by scientists at Hopkins Marine Station, the university's marine research center on Monterey Bay.

The program also will offer free programs, including a July 14 panel discussion with four professional artists involved in Stanford Summer Theater's upcoming production of Lysistrata: playwright Amy Freed, a lecturer in the Drama Department; Bay Area actor Geoff Hoyle; director Rush Rehm, associate professor of drama and classics; and composer Bruce Barthol, a member of the San Francisco Mime Troupe. Taking inspiration from Aristophanes' classic anti-war comedy, the panel will explore how "serious laughter" can deliver simple truths and incisive social critique.

A low-cost ($15) special event, "Gravity Probe B: Untwisting the Fabric of Space-Time," is set for July 12 and will offer the public an opportunity to learn about the spacecraft developed by Stanford, NASA and Lockheed Martin to test Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. Edward Ingraham, NASA's resident manager for the Gravity Probe B Program at Stanford, and Rex Geveden, program manager for NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, will give a multimedia presentation detailing the history of the program, the subsystems of the spacecraft and its planned launch later this year.

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