[edtech] The MIT OpenCourseWare Update -- Vol. 2, Issue 8

Tue Aug 17 16:51:33 EDT 2004

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The MIT OpenCourseWare Update: August 2004

A Monthly E-mail Newsletter for Users
and Friends of MIT OpenCourseWare
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The August 2004 MIT OpenCourseWare Update Contains:
1. New Courses Now Available
2. Upcoming MIT OCW Presentations
3. Digging Deeper: Course 8.224
4. A Frequently Asked Question
5. Comments
6. Newsletter Available Online at 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Global/AboutOCW/newsletter.htm>http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Global/AboutOCW/newsletter.htm

1. New Courses Now Available
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Over the course of the summer, MIT OpenCourseWare will employ a 
"rolling" publication schedule, releasing batches of new courses to 
the Web site at <http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html>http://ocw.mit.edu on 
a weekly basis, leading to the publication of 200 new courses by 
September 15. This milestone will mark the halfway point as MIT OCW 
works toward the publication of virtually all of MIT's courses by the 
year 2008. This month, we are pleased to offer the course materials 
from 12 new MIT subjects, including:

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Electrical-Engineering-and-Computer-Science/6-253Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>6.253 
-- Convex Analysis and Optimization, Spring 2004
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Electrical-Engineering-and-Computer-Science/6-432Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>6.432 
-- Stochastic Processes, Detection, and Estimation, Spring 2004
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Electrical-Engineering-and-Computer-Science/6-844Spring2003/CourseHome/index.htm>6.844 
-- Computability Theory of and with Scheme, Spring 2003

Media Arts and Sciences
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Media-Arts-and-Sciences/MAS-962Fall1997/CourseHome/index.htm>MAS.962 
-- Digital Typography, Fall 1997

Physics
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-311Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>8.311 
-- Electromagnetic Theory, Spring 2004
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-942Fall2001/CourseHome/index.htm>8.942 
-- Cosmology, Fall 2001
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-962Spring2002/CourseHome/index.htm>8.962 
-- General Relativity, Spring 2002

Political Science
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Political-Science/17-20Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>17.20 
-- Introduction to the American Political Process, Spring 2004
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Political-Science/17-951Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>17.951 
-- Special Graduate Topic in Political Science: Public Opinion, 
Spring 2004

Science, Technology, and Society
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Science--Technology--and-Society/STS-035Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>STS.035 
-- The History of Computing, Spring 2004
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Science--Technology--and-Society/STS-436Spring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>STS.436 
-- Cold War Science, Spring 2004

Women's Studies
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Anthropology/21A-230JSpring2004/CourseHome/index.htm>SP.456J 
-- The Contemporary American Family, Spring 2004

MIT OCW will continue to publish new courses every week through 
September 15. For a complete list of all course offerings, visit the 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Global/all-courses.htm>complete course 
list.

2. Upcoming MIT OCW Presentations
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Educators and learners interested in finding out more about MIT OCW 
are encouraged to attend several upcoming educational and information 
technology conferences. Various members of the MIT OCW staff will 
attend these events and would welcome meeting users of the materials 
available on the MIT OCW Web site.

On Wednesday, September 1, Jon Paul Potts, the MIT OCW Communications 
Manager, will speak at the 16th annual 
<http://itinstitute.usu.edu/>Instructional Technology Institute at 
Utah State University in Logan, UT.

In October, MIT OCW staff will be speaking at the 
<http://www.educause.edu/conference/annual/2004/>EDUCAUSE 2004 
Conference in Denver, CO. On Thursday, October 21, Potts will speak 
on "The Impact of Open Sharing: MIT OpenCourseWare," at 11:45 am, and 
at 4:55 pm, MIT OCW staff will host a poster session and would be 
glad to meet with anyone who has questions about the MIT OCW project.

Anne H. Margulies, the Executive Director of the MIT OCW project, 
will be joined by members of the MIT faculty at the China Open 
Resources for Education (CORE) International Forum 2004, to be held 
September 1-4 in Shanghai. This international conference will explore 
open course resources sharing, management, and technology for 
effective utilization and enhancement of education. For information 
on this event, or to discover more about CORE, visit 
<http://www.njtu.edu.cn/jg/jgws/content/core.htm>http://www.njtu.edu.cn/jg/jgws/content/core.htm

MIT OCW staff will also be speaking in Japan this fall. Farnaz 
Haghseta, the External Outreach Coordinator for the MIT OCW project, 
will be speaking at the <http://www.nime.ac.jp/conf2004e/>2004 NIME 
International Symposium. This event, to be held at Japan's National 
Institute of Multimedia Education in Mihama-ku, Chiba-shi, Japan, 
will take place November 17-18.

3. Digging Deeper: Course 8.224
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Can I see a black hole at all? If I can see it, what does a black 
hole look like? Does it look black? What does it feel like to fall 
toward a black hole? Each month, this newsletter offers subscribers 
an in-depth guide to one particular subject, and this month, we delve 
into Professors Edmund Berthschinger and Edwin Taylor's 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/CourseHome/index.htm>Course 
8.224 -- Exploring Black Holes: General Relativity and Astrophysics, 
from MIT's <http://web.mit.edu/physics/>Department of Physics.

Professor Bertschinger is a theoretical astrophysicist who serves as 
head of MIT's 
<http://web.mit.edu/physics/research/areasofresearch/astrophysics/astrophysics.html>Division 
of Astrophysics. His research is focused in cosmology and 
relativistic astrophysics, and 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/CourseHome/index.htm>Exploring 
Black Holes is one of three courses available from Professor 
Bertschinger on MIT OCW, the other two being 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-942Fall2001/CourseHome/index.htm>Course 
8.942 -- Cosmology and 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-962Spring2002/CourseHome/index.htm>Course 
8.962 -- General Relativity. Professor Taylor is a Senior Research 
Scientist Emeritus at MIT.

Course 8.224 investigates the questions of the cosmos using 
elementary calculus. The course homepage features a beautiful image 
taken by the orbiting Chandra X-ray Observatory, as presented on 
<http://apod.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/>NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day 
Web site. The course site includes 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/Assignments/index.htm>Assignments, 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/Exams/index.htm>Exams, 
and a description of the 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/Projects/index.htm>end-of-term 
collaborative research project that MIT students enrolled in the 
course must complete.

The 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/LectureNotes/index.htm>Lecture 
Notes for this course include slides, PDFs, and/or videos for each of 
the seminar sessions, covering topics such as "The Universe: 
Questions You Were Afraid to Ask," "Supermassive Black Hole at the 
Center of Our Galaxy -- Sagittarius A*," and "Cosmic Structure 
Formation: From Inflation to Galaxies."

MIT OCW users are advised to check out MIT Professor Robert Jaffe's 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-20Introduction-to-Special-RelativityJanuary--IAP-2003/CourseHome/index.htm>Course 
8.20 -- Introduction to Special Relativity as a prerequisite for 
Course 8.224. Professor Jaffe's MIT OCW Web site introduces users to 
the basic ideas and equations of Albert Einstein's Special Theory of 
Relativity, and will help them to better understand the subject 
matter of 
<http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-224Exploring-Black-Holes--General-Relativity---AstrophysicsSpring2003/CourseHome/index.htm>Exploring 
Black Holes.

4. A Frequently Asked Question
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QUESTION: I have seen (or I am/represent) an individual, 
organization, or institution that offers to teach MIT courses or 
tutor students based on MIT materials. Does MIT approve or recognize 
such individuals or organizations?
ANSWER: No, MIT has no relationship with, grants no special 
permission to, and does not approve, endorse, or certify any 
organizations, teachers, tutors, or other service providers who use 
educational materials available on the MIT OCW Web site in connection 
with their services. Except for students admitted to MIT and enrolled 
at the Institute, MIT does not authorize the granting of any kind of 
degree, certificate, or other recognition for participation in or 
completion of any course of study based on or using published MIT 
course materials.

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<http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html>MIT OpenCourseWare (MIT OCW) is a 
large-scale, Web-based publishing initiative with the goal of 
providing free, searchable access to MIT course materials for 
educators, students, and individual learners around the world. These 
materials are offered in a single, searchable structure spanning all 
of MIT's academic disciplines, and include uniform metadata about the 
contents of the individual subject sites.

"The MIT OpenCourseWare Update" welcomes your feedback and 
suggestions about this newsletter and the MIT OCW Web site. Please 
send your feedback to Jon Paul Potts, MIT OCW Communications Manager, 
at <mailto:jpotts at mit.edu>jpotts at mit.edu.

To subscribe a friend to this newsletter, forward the following link to them:
<http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/ocw-mail>http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/ocw-mail

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