In this course, learners will become familiar with the scientific evidence that demonstrates human-caused climate change. We will explore how greenhouse gases cause the Earth to warm, and why our recent warming is attributed to human activities. We will also discuss where our climate is headed, including anticipated future temperature, precipitation, and sea level. Learners will engage with the consequences of these changes on our ecosystems, infrastructure, and communities. We will also identify how political beliefs influence our attitudes about climate change, and apply that knowledge to become better climate communicators.

This four-week, four-module course explores selective aspects of the Australian economy, with emphasis on macroeconomic and financial policies. The course introduces participants to several key attributes of the Australian economy and discusses how they are influenced by both domestic and international forces. We will examine some of the key issues and dilemmas facing the Australian economy and how policymakers can deal with them using monetary and fiscal policies. There will also be a discussion on the still-fresh 2007-2010s global financial crisis, the lessons learned, and how policymakers deal with the aftermath. Discussions will be centered around sound economic theories and reasoning, and utilize actual data whenever applicable. Applications of the economic reasoning and theories to current, real-world issues pertaining to the Australian economy will also be provided. In addition to conventional lectures, the course also contains several interviews with relevant experts and practitioners. No prior knowledge or training in economics is required.

In the culminating project, you will develop new trading strategies, evaluate them using the tools learned in the course, integrate them with the existing portfolio and also develop a plan to start a hedge fund.

CONGRATULATIONS! Not only did you accomplish to finish our intellectual tour de force, but, by now, you also already have all required skills to execute a comprehensive multi-method workflow of computational social science. We will put these skills to work in this final integrative lab, where we are bringing it all together. We scrape data from a social media site (drawing on the skills obtained in the 1st course of this specialization). We then analyze the collected data by visualizing the resulting networks (building on the skills obtained in the 3rd course). We analyze some key aspects of it in depth, using machine learning powered natural language processing (putting to work the insights obtained during the 2nd course). Finally, we use a computer simulation model to explore possible generative mechanism and scrutinize aspects that we did not find in our empirical reality, but that help us to improve this aspect of society (drawing on the skills obtained during the 4th course of this specialization). The result is the first glimpse at a new way of doing social science in a digital age: computational social science. Congratulations! Having done all of this yourself, you can consider yourself a fledgling computational social scientist!

Genially is “the tool that brings content to life.” Genially allows you to map out a learning journey for your students using high interest images and interactive tools. By the end of this project, you will be ready to engage your students by creating mind maps to organize and teach content and to help students show their learning.

Suffering is an inevitable yet poorly understood feature of human existence. This course examines how societies respond to the puzzling reality of human anguish. Among the questions it addresses are the following: What is suffering? Which types of human affliction are unique to the modern world? Have the meaning and portrayal of suffering changed over time? Do digital media sensitize or desensitize us to the anguish of distant others? In addition to introducing students to academic literature and debates on these topics, Suffering and the Human Condition will give them the opportunity to learn a method for studying human affliction that identifies the actors that perpetuate it.

This course provides an overview of Thomas Jefferson's work and perspectives presented by the University of Virginia in partnership with Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Together, UVA and Monticello are recognized internationally as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

In this course, 50 leading scholars from all over the world will explore questions and issues relating to antisemitism including: what is antisemitism? How has it changed throughout history? Why can it be found among so many diverse cultures, and even among opposing ideologies? What happened to antisemitism after the Holocaust? How is antisemitism expressed today, and what are the main spheres in which it can be found?

The Final Project will be a hands-on, comprehensive project that practitioners of virtual education can implement in their profession. For this final project, learners will draft a design plan for an online learning module utilizing materials learned from the virtual teacher series. Learners will choose the subject matter, method of delivery, tools, instructional strategies, and assessments, with the goal of creating a module of online or blended instruction that meets the needs of their students. Learners do not have to create, develop or teach the online learning module they design. Upon completing this course, you will be able to: 1. Design a fully online or blended instructional module 2. Apply theories and/or strategies of effective online instruction

We make economics decisions every day: what to buy, whether to work or play, what to study. We respond to markets all the time: prices influence our decisions, markets signal where to put effort, they direct firms to produce certain goods over others. Economics is all around us. This course is an introduction to the microeconomic theory of markets: why we have them, how they work, what they accomplish. We will start with the concept of scarcity and how specialization according to comparative advantage helps us achieve more than we could alone. Next we model a marked using the tools of Supply and Demand and learn what well working markets accomplish and what their limit are. We end by exploring the impact of government intervention on perfect markets. Examples are taken from everyday life, from goods and services that we all purchase and use. We will apply the theory to current events and policy debates through weekly exercises. These will empower you to be an educated, critical thinker who can understand, analyze and evaluate market outcomes.