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by MIT OpenCourseWare
Chalk Radio is an MIT OpenCourseWare podcast about inspired teaching at MIT. We take you behind the scenes of some of the most interesting courses on campus to talk with the professors who make those courses possible. Our guests open up to us about the passions that drive their cutting-edge research and innovative teaching, sharing stories that are candid, funny, serious, personal, and full of insights. Listening in on these conversations is like being right here with us in person under the MIT dome, talking with your favorite professors. And because each of our guests shares teaching materials on OCW, it's easy to take a deeper dive into the topics that inspire you. If you're an educator, you can make these teaching materials your own because they're all openly-licensed. Hosted by Dr. Sarah Hansen from MIT Open Learning. Chalk Radio episodes are offered under a CC BY-NC-SA license.
Latest Episodes
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- Mar 5, 202646 min
Misinformation, AI, & Science Photography
Science photographer Felice Frankel is acclaimed for the striking beauty of her images, which have been displayed in museums, published in multiple books, and even featured in the background in one of Ang Lee’s films. Yet she insists that she doesn’t think of herself as an artist. Her academic background is in biology, she began her working life doing cancer research at Columbia University, and she doesn’t see her photographic work as a form of self-expression. Instead, the subtle decisions she makes in setting up a composition, taking the photo, cropping it, and so on, are all in the service of creating an image that will communicate vital facts about the phenomenon she’s capturing. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t also want her images to be visually gripping and aesthetically appealing, but for her, the science always comes first, and any manipulations that obscure the truth are unacceptable. In this episode, Frankel talks with host Sarah Hansen about stumbling into a career as a science photographer, about sparring with researchers over photographic design decisions, and about what happened when she attempted to use AI to duplicate one of her images. Check out the Video version of this interview on YouTube ... and check out her most recent work on OCW, Generative AI and Science Photography, here ➟ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0I8S6diyDjw Relevant Resources: MIT OpenCourseWare The OCW Educator portal Felice Frankel’s personal website Felice Frankel on Wikipedia RES.10-001 Making Science and Engineering Pictures: A Practical Guide to Presenting Your Work on MIT OpenCourseWare Phenomenal Moments (book) Video version of this interview on YouTube Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Jan 15, 202634 min
Special Episode: Collaborating with Community Colleges
MIT OpenCourseWare has been one of the pioneers of open education, leading the way by offering free materials from MIT courses as early as 2001, when no other institutions were pursuing comparably ambitious initiatives. But in subsequent years, there’s been an explosion of activity in open education, led by faculty members, instructional designers, and librarians at institutions throughout the United States and worldwide. In this episode, we hear from senior manager of MIT Open Education collaborations, Dr. Shira Segal, who talks about MIT’s efforts to team up with and learn from open education practitioners at the Maricopa County Community College District in Arizona, whose energetic promotion of open educational resources has saved students over $270 million in textbook costs, and College of the Canyons in California, a leader in the Zero Textbook Cost movement. We also hear excerpts from interviews with four instructors from those colleges, who talk about the potential benefits and unexpected challenges of using open educational resources in general, and about what they learned from their experiences in adapting OCW materials for use in their own classes.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator PortalMore on MIT OpenCourseWare’s collaboration with community collegesMaricopa County Community College DistrictCollege of the CanyonsMaricopa Community Colleges Save Students $270M in TextbooksOER and Zero Textbook Cost at College of the CanyonsMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Nov 5, 202529 min
MIT Economist Jon Gruber on AI, Trade-offs & Healthcare
Prof. Jonathan Gruber, our guest for this episode, likes to tell his students that economics is a fundamentally right-wing science. What he means by that is that classical economics is built on one powerful explanatory insight: that free markets—networks of buyers and sellers, producers and consumers, weighing the trade-offs of different options and making self-interested choices based on supply and demand—do a better job of deciding how to allocate resources than can be achieved by a top-down, command-economy approach. But as Gruber goes on to explain, that principle only holds when all participants have equal access to markets and to information; in the real world, imbalances in that access lead to market failures, inefficient allocations of resources that leave most people worse off than they would otherwise be. That’s why government regulation still has a role in a properly functioning economy. Tune in to hear Prof. Gruber explain why we need “capitalism with gutter guards” to ensure equitable outcomes, especially in sectors of the economy such as healthcare where the ideal markets envisioned by classical economics are particularly unattainable or undesirable. Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalProf. Gruber’s faculty page14.01 Principles of Microeconomics on MIT OpenCourseWare14.41 Public Finance and Public Policy on MIT OpenCourseWarePower and Progress (book by Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson)Video version of this interview on YouTubeMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- May 14, 202530 min
MIT Programmer Ana Bell on Growth Mindset, Coding, and Rubber Ducks
Learn about Python, growth mindset, and the uses of rubber ducks in this interview with MIT lecturer Ana Bell. Dr. Bell, who has been programming since she was twelve and now teaches popular introductory courses in computer science, says that coding consists of almost equal parts creativity and logic. The creative part, she explains, gets exercised particularly when you have to come up with an algorithm to solve a given problem, because for any given complex problem there are many possible approaches to tackling it. The logical part comes into play when you sit down to translate that algorithm into an unambiguous sequence of rules in a programming language, and again when you discover that the code you’ve written doesn’t work exactly as you intended it to and you have to set about debugging it. Among the topics the conversation addresses are why everyone–even in the age of generative AI– ought to study at least the basics of programming, why it can be useful to speak to an inanimate object when your coding project is stuck in the debugging stage, and how programming can help you choose your own adventure. Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalDr. Bell’s faculty page6.100 L Introduction to Computer Science and Programming using Python on MIT OpenCourseWare6.0001 [now 6.100A] Introduction to Computer Science and Programming in Python on MIT OpenCourseWare6.0002 [now 6.100B] Introduction to Computational Thinking and Data Science on MIT OpenCourseWareGet Programming: Learn to Code with Python (book by Dr. Bell)Doodle Debug (coloring book by Dr. Bell)Video version of this interview on YouTubeMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Apr 16, 202539 min
MIT Economist Andrew W. Lo on Finance, AI, and Human Behavior
In this the first of two pilot episodes of Chalk Radio with VIDEO, Professor Andrew Lo, who teaches finance at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, knows that many people find financial matters perplexing and scary. Lots of us don’t have a good head for numbers, and besides, how can one get advice and make sound decisions when it’s taboo to discuss one’s finances at all? That’s where a financial advisor is useful–someone who understands the concepts, can crunch the numbers, and has a fiduciary responsibility to look out for your best interests. For many people, hiring a financial advisor might be a financial impossibility, but Prof. Lo and his colleagues are working to develop an AI financial advisor that not only gives ordinary people access to sound financial advice, but acts with real fiduciary responsibility. Large language models can’t do this yet, he says, but the technology is developing fast. Other topics he touches on in this episode include the outsized influence of finance on drug development and global decarbonization and the equally outsized influence of teachers on their students–he names many who changed his own life, from his third-grade teacher in Queens to his professors at college and graduate school. Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalProfessor Lo’s faculty page15.401 Finance Theory I on MIT OpenCourseWare15.481x Adaptive Markets: Financial Market Dynamics and Human Behavior on MIT Open Learning Library15.482x Healthcare Finance on MIT Open Learning LibraryVideo version of this interview on YouTubeMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Dec 18, 202429 min
Sujood from Sudan: An Open Learner's Story
Sujood Khalid Eldouma recently relocated to the UK for her master’s studies, having previously lived in Egypt after fleeing her native Sudan to escape the devastating civil war in that country. Sujood holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Khartoum, but her ambitions extend far beyond the field she was trained in. She recently graduated from the MIT Emerging Talent certificate program in Computer and Data Science and is pursuing a MicroMasters in statistics and data science through the support of MIT Emerging Talent. In this episode, we hear how Sujood and her classmates at the university in Khartoum used MIT OpenCourseWare lecture videos as the basis of a group learning experience, in which knowledge was shared and lasting friendships were formed. We also hear how Sujood is pursuing her current online studies not just as a means of self-improvement but as part of the groundwork for a much bigger, future project: helping to rebuild Sudan’s educational and scientific infrastructure when peace comes to that country. “I'm not doing it just for myself,” she says. “I'm not doing it just for my family, but in the bigger picture and with a heart filled with hope.”The Open Learners podcast is produced by Alexis Haut and hosted by Emmanuel Kasigazi and Michael Jordan Pilgreen.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalMIT Emerging Talent programMIT MicroMasters Program in Statistics and Data ScienceMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Share Your Open Learning StoryTo share your own open learning story with Michael and Emmanuel, send them an email at open_learners_pod@mit.edu. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Dec 4, 202426 min
Jerry from Uganda: An Open Learner's Story
They say every crisis also presents an opportunity. Open learner Jerry Vance Anguzu seized one such opportunity in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, when his native country of Uganda went into lockdown. Jerry was stuck at home, unable to earn a living, but that enforced inactivity gave him the chance to pursue new directions in his education. A few years earlier, he had discovered MIT OpenCourseWare and had seen what it had to offer; now he returned to MIT Open Learning resources in earnest, plowing through courses in data science and computer programming; soon thereafter he was accepted into the MIT Emerging Talent certificate program, where he began to develop an interest in entrepreneurship. Now, just a few years later, Jerry has his own startup, Everpesa Technologies, a financial services platform that offers sustainable investment opportunities and financial literacy resources to people in sub-Saharan Africa. Along the way, he has become a self-described “OCW ambassador,” enthusiastically spreading the word to relatives and colleagues about the learning resources that are available online through MIT OpenCourseWare. “You don’t need to pay anything,” Jerry tells them. “You just need to have a bit of time.”The Open Learners podcast is produced by Alexis Haut and hosted by Emmanuel Kasigazi and Michael Jordan Pilgreen.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalMIT Emerging Talent programMIT Jameel World Education LabMIT MicroMasters Program in Statistics and Data ScienceEverpesa website6.0001 Introduction to Computer Science and Programming in Python on MIT OpenCourseWareMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Share Your Open Learning StoryTo share your own open learning story with Michael and Emmanuel, send them an email at open_learners_pod@mit.edu. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
- Nov 13, 202425 min
Lotfullah from Afghanistan: An Open Learner's Story
Our guest for this episode, Lotfullah Andishmand, grew up in a village in rural Afghanistan where there was no internet access or electric lights. (He describes having had to navigate by moonlight to get to his uncle’s house for tutoring in chemistry.) In search of educational opportunity, he eventually moved to Kabul, where he discovered MIT OpenCourseWare’s lecture videos while studying electrical engineering at the university. Even there, though, the internet infrastructure was shaky enough that Lotfullah often resorted to downloading the course materials so he could study them at leisure when broadband wasn’t available. He now resides in India and recently graduated from the MIT Emerging Talent certificate program in Computer and Data Science, specifically designed for displaced communities worldwide. As he continues his educational journey in data science and artificial intelligence, he remains deeply mindful of the challenges he encountered as a student in his home country. Recognizing that most of the available online educational resources are in English, a language few Afghans are fluent in, Lotfullah has used his computer skills to create an online learning platform offering educational materials in Persian. Someday, he hopes the platform will expand to include full online courses with direct interaction between instructors and students.The Open Learners podcast is produced by Alexis Haut and hosted by Emmanuel Kasigazi and Michael Jordan Pilgreen. Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator portalMIT Emerging Talent programMIT MicroMasters Program in Statistics and Data Science6.0001 Introduction to Computer Science and Programming in Python on MIT OpenCourseWareHooshmand Lab online learning website (in Persian)Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Share Your Open Learning StoryTo share your own open learning story with Michael and Emmanuel, send them an email at open_learners_pod@mit.edu. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer Dave Lishansky, producer Jackson Maher, producerShow notes by Peter Chipman
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About Chalk Radio
Chalk Radio is an MIT OpenCourseWare podcast about inspired teaching at MIT. We take you behind the scenes of some of the most interesting courses on campus to talk with the professors who make those courses possible. Our guests open up to us about the passions that drive their cutting-edge research and innovative teaching, sharing stories that are candid, funny, serious, personal, and full of insights. Listening in on these conversations is like being right here with us in person under the MIT dome, talking with your favorite professors. And because each of our guests shares teaching materials on OCW, it's easy to take a deeper dive into the topics that inspire you. If you're an educator, you can make these teaching materials your own because they're all openly-licensed. Hosted by Dr. Sarah Hansen from MIT Open Learning. Chalk Radio episodes are offered under a CC BY-NC-SA license.
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Frequently Asked Questions
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