- 06 Feb 2017
Join David Feldman on his journey through the fascinating world of fractals and their relationship to power laws and scaling by enrolling in his highly-rated course Fractals and Scaling, starting February 13th. Help us spread the word - let everyone in your networks know about this course and convince a few to enroll! If you've yet to take one of David Feldman's courses, you're missing out. Sign up now and find out why one student said that "If David Feldman decided to give a course on the California sewage system, I would take it!" Sewage systems as complex systems? We could see that.
Complexity Explorer swag on its way to December donation drive winners
In December, every person who donated to Complexity Explorer (no matter the amount) was entered to win one of five t-shirts or tote bags to be shipped to them anywhere in the world. Congratulations to the winners! A few of them agreed to share a little bit about themselves.
Enzo Loner gave to help us so that we can continue to offer free courses. He hopes other students will donate for the same reason. Enzo is a research assistant in the Department of Sociology and Social Reseach in Trento, Italy, and he studies social simulation and complex systems on the side. He learned about Complexity Explorer through Research Gate. We're sending him a small black t-shirt for his son to wear.
Claus Frier, in Denmark, is getting a tote bag. He donated after taking Melanie Mitchell's Introduction to Complexity course, which he loved so much he felt he had no option but to give back to us. Complexity Explorer entered his life after repeatedly seeing references to the website and to the Santa Fe Institute every time he searched for information on complexity theory. His work on sustainability has been missing that complexity link, and he hopes to find it through our courses.
Erika Frydenlund will be sporting a blue t-shirt around Portsmouth, Virginia. She is an alum of SFI's Graduate Workshop in Computational Social Sciences from 2015 and so knows us quite well. She keeps checking in with Complexity Explorer to continue her education in complexity. She chose to donate to our program because she thinks the reach of the online platform to bring complexity learning to so many people is really important. In her words, Complexity Explorer brings big names in the field to everyone, including those that don't have the chance to come out to SFI. She always recommends our courses to everyone she knows.
Benny Haim will also be wearing a blue t-shirt, but in Israel. He donates yearly as a way to express his gratitude for having free access to all of Complexity Explorer's learning materials. Supporting the program as it grows is important, he says, and we are very grateful that he thinks so!
Thank you to every one of you that donated in 2016. In 2017 we face our biggest challenge yet - raising funds to keep the program running in 2018. Thanks to your donations in 2015 and 2016, we already have some funds to build on, and we will let you know as the year progresses the status of our fundraising efforts.
Subtitle Project
We've been seeing a core group of very dedicated volunteers working fervently to create captions and subtitles for the Fractals and Scaling course, the Introduction to Agent-based Modeling course, and also our tutorials. In December we rewarded Hector de Moura Luz and Vinh Dang with t-shirts for creating more than 120 minutes of subtitles - welcome to the list of star volunteers! We need motivated volunteers to join Cigdem Yalcin who has been almost single-handedly creating English captions for Fractals and Scaling. The course launches in one week - how much can you do before it launches? Even 5 minutes of your time will make a difference. Join the team today.
Staffing News
2016 was a very busy year, and 2017 will be even more so. To help achieve our lofty goals, we have added another person to our team. We would like to welcome Julia Heusinkveld to the Complexity Explorer team as a Program Assistant for 2017. She is an enthusiastic person with a degree in economics and a passion for all things complexity. Look out for her answering emails, interacting with subtitle volunteers, writing articles and in general just helping to make things happen! Now that she is on board, we will finally get you those new tutorials you've all been waiting for, among other things. We also have a new Director of Education at SFI: Dr. Paul Hooper. Expect to see his hand guiding SFI's education strategy in the years to come.
