Here is your update for December 19, 2024,

As the holiday season approaches and the year comes to a close, we would like to remind all OLLI members of a few key dates. Emory University and the OLLI Office will be closed from December 24, 2024, to January 1, 2025.

Our OLLI instructors are already reviewing registrations for the January classes. Is your name on their list?

Why is this important?
We strongly encourage you to register now for our January classes! Early registration helps our instructors with planning, allows us to assign classrooms, and ensures the necessary technology is in place. By registering now, you play a key role in making sure classes move forward and that we can accommodate everyone.

The OLLI team is available to assist with registration until 12 PM on December 23. While you can still register during the first week of January, please note that we will be finalizing class schedules then. If an instructor sees low enrollment, they may choose to cancel a class early, during the holiday break, as it takes a great deal of preparation to teach.

All of our classes and information are available on the OLLI at Emory website. Don't miss out—register today and get ready to explore all the exciting opportunities ahead!
Check out our Latest Updates right here and our OLLI catalog.

Meet upcoming OLLI Instructor Tameka Anderson

Maximizing Potential: Unmet Needs & Community
Monday's, January 13- February 24, 2025, 11:30AM - 12:30PM

This course explores the critical role that identifying unmet needs and building strong communities play in personal and collective growth. It aims to equip participants with the tools and insights necessary to recognize and address gaps in their own lives and the lives of others, fostering a sense of belonging and empowering them to reach their highest potential. Watch video. Click here to register.

The Planets of our Solar System 

Instructor: Peter Campos
Thursday's, January 16 - February 27, 2025, 11:30AM - 12:30PM

Officially, there are eight main planets in our solar system (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune); Pluto was demoted to “dwarf planet” status in 2006; I will cover Pluto alone in a separate, one-day, “lunch and learn” class. For this course, we will devote a class period to each of remaining planets (except Earth), examining information gleaned from spacecraft fly-bys, telescope imaging, and surface explorations. Marvel at some stunning images; learn about planetary facts, characteristics, and satellites; and consider what life might be like if it existed there. In addition, after our coverage of Mars we will learn about the asteroids, and after we finish with Neptune, we’ll explore the Trans-Neptunian Objects in the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud. Click here to register. 

Meet upcoming OLLI Instructor, Alice Huang
What Could They Be Thinking? Let's Find Out!
Thursday's, January 16 - February 6, 2025, 11:30AM - 1:00PM
Are you tired of feeling like you can’t talk with others about topics you disagree about, because you feel like even raising questions is likely to offend them or make the relationships uncomfortable? Would you like to learn more of the nuances of what people are thinking when they see things differently than you do? This is a workshop, for participants to consider and respond to this tendency to push people into mutually exclusive us-vs-them categories. We will consider what this does to public discourse and then explore together the nuances of some topics of interest to the participants. Bring ideas to the first class of topics you would like to learn more about. (Max 16 Students) . Watch video or Click here to register. 

Partners of Authors and Why They Matter

Instructor: George deMan & Jill Parks
Thursday's, January 16 -  February 6, 2025, 10 - 11:00AM

This course explores the relationships of prominent fiction authors from the 19th and 20th centuries, many of whom had wives or partners who were equally renowned, and in some cases, literary figures themselves. These partnerships varied greatly in their impact on the authors' work—some served as hindrances, while others offered significant support.

We will examine writers such as Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, and her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley; Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald; D.H. Lawrence and Frieda Lawrence; Ernest Hemingway and his various wives; Leo Tolstoy and his wife Sofia; Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) and Olivia Clemens; among others. Through our discussions, we will analyze both the positive and negative dynamics within these literary partnerships. Click here to register. 

A Journey into the Semiotics of Advertising, the Subtle Art of Influence

Instructor: Robert Drake
Wed. January 15- February 26, 2025 - 11:30AM - 12:30PM

Explore the hidden language of advertisements in The Semiotics of Advertisement. Every day, signs, symbols, and icons shape your choices, often without your awareness. This engaging class will reveal the subtle art of influence that advertisers masterfully employ to guide your buying behavior. Through lively discussions and examples, you’ll learn to spot these powerful semiotic cues. For those wanting to try your hand at uncovering examples, you, too, can share and showcase what you observe. Join us to sharpen your understanding of the unseen forces at play in modern advertising! Register here. 

Watch the video of Robert describing his upcoming class with OLLI at Emory.