Energy (and Other) Events is a weekly mailing list published most Sundays covering events around the Cambridge, MA and greater
Boston area that catch the editor's eye.
Hubevents http://hubevents.blogspot.com is the web version.
If you wish to subscribe or unsubscribe to Energy (and Other) Events email gmoke@world.std.com
What I Do and Why I Do It: The Story of Energy (and Other) EventsGeo
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Details of these events are available when you scroll past the index
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Index
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Monday, December 3
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12pm Distinguished Speaker Series: Maura Healey
12pm PAOC [Program on Atmospheres, Oceans, Climates] Colloquium: Daniel Rothman (MIT)
12pm MyShake: Global Earthquake Detection with Smartphones
12pm The Oil Climate Index: Analyzing the Heterogeneous Lifecycle Greenhouse Gas Impacts of Global Oils
12:10pm Embracing the complexity of nature –genomic approaches for understanding the development and evolution of forest trees
12:15pm Failed Sociotechnical Imaginaries: Chechnya as the 'Second Kuwait’
12:30pm Felicity Scott and Mark Wasiuta | AgitArch Experiments Roundtable
1pm Book Talk — Politics with the People: Building a Directly Representative Democracy
3pm Beyond Biofeedback and Towards Machine Based Learning in Treating the Extremities of Post-Stroke Survivors
3:30pm The State of Online Speech and Governance
4pm The Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the Childhood Roots of Social Mobility (IDSS Distinguished Speaker Seminar:)
4:15pm Behind the Midterm Data: Understanding Political Realignment in the U.S.
5:30pm This Ain’t Normal: Film Screening & Discussion
6pm Joan Jonas and Sung Hwan Kim: In Conversation
6pm SPI December Discussion: Micro-mobility
6pm ONLINE SHOPPING: FRIEND OR FOE?
7pm Solving Our Climate Crisis: A National Town Hall
7pm The Future of Transportation: Autonomy and Interdependence
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Tuesday, December 4
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11am Thesis Defense: Computational Analysis of the Biophysical Controls on Southern Ocean Phytoplankton Ecosystem Dynamics
12pm “My Constellation is Space”: Towards a Theory of Black Cyberculture
1pm Webinar: What's a Green New Deal?
1pm RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN SOIL MICROBIAL PHYSIOLOGY, COMMUNITY COMPOSITION AND CARBON AND NITROGEN CYCLING IN TEMPERATE FOREST ECOSYSTEMS
2:30pm Climate change and food security in the Asia-Pacific: Response and resilience
3:30pm Will solid-state batteries compete with liquid-based Li-ion technology?
4:15pm The Meaning of the Midterms: Who Counted? Who Voted?
4:30pm Asian Americans and Affirmative Action Policy
4:30pm Startup R&D Demo Daya
4:30pm Azov Sea: A Winter War?
5:30pm Start-Up Nation Tech Fair at Northeastern University
5:30pm Cleantech Capital: Funding the Energy Future
6pm From Boston to Yorktown: Tales of the National Trails
6pm Race, Political Solidarity & the Future of America
6pm Future of Work: Will Artificial Intelligence and Robots Replace Humans or Create New Job Types?
6:30pm Defining the future of jobs in the midst of AI revolution
7pm The Ethics of Species Conservation
7pm Boston’s Pre-Revolutionary Newspaper Wars (and What They May Tell Us About Today’s News Media
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Wednesday, December 5
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12pm BEING SERIOUSLY ILL IN THE U.S.: Financial and Healthcare Impacts | Forum
12pm Pulse of the People: Rap Music and Black Politics
4pm "Likely to Become a Public Charge": Federal Immigration Policy and the Health of Our Communities
4:15pm Prices versus Quantities Reassessed
4:30pm Resourcing The World, Allison Porter, Veolia North America
5pm Energy for a Changing World – An Introduction to Shell Technology Centre Bangalore
5:30pm The Digital Is Not Neutral: Thoughts on the Digitization of Threatened Cultural Heritage
5:30pm Cannabis Technology, High Possibilities
6pm UN Climate Negotiations: What has been achieved, where have we failed and what lessons can be drawn?
6pm Tackling The New Sharing Economy with Origin Protocol
7pm Lest We Forget: A Doctor's Experience with Life and Death During the Ebola Outbreak
7pm Mission 2022 Final Presentation
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Thursday, December 6
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8:30am Design Thinking for Social Innovation Workshop
8:30am Urban Health: State of the Science
11:30am MIT China Forum: China's Universities in Perspective
12pm Walking Data and Talking Sculptures: Artistic Experiments in Environmental Education
12:15pm Changing Security Dynamics in the Persian Gulf
3pm xTalk with Prof. Emanuel "Ely” Sachs: Guided Discovery as a Teaching Method
3:30pm Health Benefit of On-Road Vehicular Emissions Control Program in China
4:30pm The Political Economy of Energy and the Potential for Conflict in the Middle East: From Iran to Gaza and Beyond
5pm Ethics in a World of Strangers
5pm Assessing the Relationship Between MIT and the Saudi Monarchy
5pm Dolores film: Documentary on Dolores Huerta of the United Farmworkers Union
5pm Groundwork and the Hanukkah Goblets at Winter Hill Brewing Co.
5:30pm Social Innovation Forum Annual Winter Reception
6pm Building a Better Internet
6pm The Hunt for Human Nature in Cold War America
6pm RPP Colloquium: Natural “SuperCooperation” and the Future of Our Human Family: Evolutionary Dynamics, Altruistic Virtues, and Spiritual Resources
6:30pm Addiction: Facing the Opioid Epidemic in Massachusetts
6:30pm Go Solar Melrose Launch Party!
6:30pm The State of AI
7pm Securing a World of Physically Capable Computers
7pm Practical Online Virtual Reality in Higher Education
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Friday, December 7
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11am Thesis Defense: Interaction Between Water Vapor, Radiation and Convection in the Tropics
12pm Photochemical Processing of Biomass Burning Smoke: Influence on Optical and Chemical Properties of Particles
12pm Ash Community Speaker Series — Leadership, Organizing, and Innovation: Making Health Care Work
12pm LEED Platinum Urban Community Development
12:30pm BU Wind: A Student Forum on our Clean Energy Future
2pm India on the U.S. Foreign Policy Agenda
2pm Nuclear Deterrence in an Age of Rapid Technological Change
5pm Jennifer Light | Playing at City Building
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Saturday, December 8
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8am MASSdestruction robot competition @Artisans Asylum Winter Marketplace
7pm Playing For The Planet: World Music Against Climate Change
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Sunday, December 9
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1pm Humanism 2019: The Challenge of Eternal Vigilance
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Monday, December 10
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Sunrise Movement Action Registration Form
11:30am Program on Misinformation
5pm Open Newsroom
5:30pm Civic XR: Using XR in the Public Interest
6pm ACT Fall 2018 Lecture Series: Untranslatable: Conceptual Art since the 90s
6:30pm Are Humans Evolved to Run: Why (and how much) exercise is good for our health
7pm Questioning U.S.-Saudi Alliance: Yemen and the Politics of Famine
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Tuesday, December 11
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12pm The Biology of Complex Social Behavior
5:15pm A Nice History of Bird Migration: Ethology, Expertise, and Conservation in 20th Century North America
6pm Mass Innovation Nights 117
6pm Boston New Technology Cloud, Security and AI Startup Showcase #BNT96 (21+)
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My rough notes on some of the events I go to and notes on books I’ve read are at:
Green New Deal, Extinction Rebellion Demands, and My Approach to Climate Change
The Gospel of Fascism
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Monday, December 3
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Distinguished Speaker Series: Maura Healey
Monday, December 3
12 PM
Tufts, Distler Auditorium, Granoff Music Center, 20 Talbot Avenue, Medford
Join Tisch College for a discussion with Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey on state and national politics, critical issues facing the Commonwealth, and what it’s like to take the President to court. Since 2015, Healey has served as the Massachusetts Attorney General, leading fights to uphold the state’s existing assault weapons ban, to overturn the Trump Administration’s controversial immigration policies, and to defend net neutrality protections. Before being elected Attorney General, Healey helped lead the Attorney General’s Office under Martha Coakley, first as Chief of the Civil Rights Division and then as director of the Public Protection & Advocacy Bureau and the Business & Labor Bureau. A prosecutor in Middlesex County and a litigation partner at WilmerHale for several years, Healey also spent two years as a 5’4” starting point guard on a professional basketball team in Austria after graduating from Harvard College and before attending law school at Northeastern University. She is the first openly gay Attorney General in the United States.
Cosponsored by the Political Science Department and JumboVote. Follow the conversation live at #AGHealeyAtTufts
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PAOC [Program on Atmospheres, Oceans, Climates] Colloquium: Daniel Rothman (MIT)
Monday, December 3
12:00pm to 1:00pm
MIT, Building 54-915, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
About this Series
The PAOC Colloquium [PAOCC] is a weekly interdisciplinary seminar series that brings together the whole PAOC community. Seminar topics include all research concerning the physics, chemistry, and biology of the atmospheres, oceans and climate, but also talks about e.g. societal impacts of climatic processes. The seminars take place on Monday from 12-1pm in 54-923. Lunch is provided after the seminars to encourage students and post-docs to meet with the speaker. Besides the seminar and lunch, individual meetings with professors, post-docs, and students are arranged. Contact the 2018/2019 Coordinators: paoc-colloquium-comm@mit.edu.
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MyShake: Global Earthquake Detection with Smartphones
Monday, December 3
12:00PM
Harvard, Haller Hall (102), Geological Museum, 24 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Richard Allen, Director, Berkeley Seismological Laboratory
Abstract: Our understanding of earthquakes and the hazards they pose is data-limited. MyShake is an effort to build a dense global seismic network to study earthquakes, shallow earth structure, and reduce the risk to societies in earthquake-prone regions. The project harnesses personal/private smartphones and detects earthquakes using the accelerometer in every phone. Since its launch, 300,000 users have downloaded the free app from the GooglePlay store, and about 7000 phones provide seismic waveform data each day. The network is able to rapidly detect and characterize earthquakes and will soon start providing earthquake early warning. Exploration of the full potential of the data is only just beginning, but includes the study of earthquakes with magnitudes as low at M1.6, seismic noise characteristics across the urban environment, and characterization of building response to earthquakes.
Bio: Richard Allen is the Director of the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory, and the Class of 1954 Professor in the the Dept. of Earth and Planetary Science at UC Berkeley. He is an expert in earthquake alerting systems, developing methodologies to detect earthquakes and issue warnings prior to shaking and tsunamis. His group uses seismic and GPS sensing networks, including the use of a global network of tens of thousands of smartphones called MyShake. Allen’s group also uses geophysical sensing networks to image the internal 3D structure of the Earth and constrain the driving forces responsible for earthquakes, volcanoes and other deformation of the Earth’s surface. His research has been featured in Science, Nature, Scientific American, the New York Times and dozens of other media outlets around the world. He has a BA from Cambridge University, a PhD from Princeton University, and was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Caltech.Richard is currently spending a sabbatical at the Dept of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University.
EPS Colloquium
Contact Name: Sabinna Cappo
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The Oil Climate Index: Analyzing the Heterogeneous Lifecycle Greenhouse Gas Impacts of Global Oils
Monday, December 3
12:00pm to 1:30pm
Harvard, Bell Hall, 5th Floor, Belfer Building, HKS, 79 Street, Cambridge
Deborah Gordon, Director, Energy and Climate Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Lunch will be served.
HKS Energy Policy Seminar
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Embracing the complexity of nature –genomic approaches for understanding the development and evolution of forest trees
Monday, December 3
12:10p
Arnold Arboretum, Weld Hill, 1300 Centre Street, Jamaica Plain
Andrew Groover, Research Geneticist, US Forest Service
WATCH LIVE on the Arboretum’s YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/user/ArnoldArboretum/) if you are unable to attend in person. The streaming video is entitled “Arnold Arboretum Live Stream” and is visible only when a live stream is in progress.
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Failed Sociotechnical Imaginaries: Chechnya as the 'Second Kuwait'
Monday, December 3
12:15PM TO 2:00PM
Harvard, Bowie-Vernon Room (K262), CGIS North, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
Olga Breininger-Umetayeva (Harvard, Slavic).
The STS Circle at Harvard is a group of doctoral students and recent PhDs who are interested in creating a space for interdisciplinary conversations about contemporary issues in science and technology that are relevant to people in fields such as anthropology, history of science, sociology, STS, law, government, public policy, and the natural sciences. We want to engage not only those who are working on intersections of science, politics, and public policy, but also those in the natural sciences, engineering, and architecture who have serious interest in exploring these areas together with social scientists and humanists.
There has been growing interest among graduate students and postdocs at Harvard in more systematic discussions related to STS. More and more dissertation writers and recent graduates find themselves working on exciting topics that intersect with STS at the edges of their respective home disciplines, and they are asking questions that often require new analytic tools that the conventional disciplines don’t necessarily offer. They would also like wider exposure to emerging STS scholarship that is not well-represented or organized at most universities, including Harvard. Our aim is to try to serve those interests through a series of activities throughout the academic year.
Sandwich lunches are provided. Please RSVP to via the online form by Wednesday at 5PM the week before.
The Harvard STS Circle is co-sponsored by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
STS Circle at Harvard
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Felicity Scott and Mark Wasiuta | AgitArch Experiments Roundtable
Monday, December 3
12:30pm to 2:00pm
MIT, Building 7-429, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Part of the Fall 2018 Experiments in Pedagogy: Agit Arch Experiments, organized by Ana Miljacki
Felicity D. Scott is professor of architecture, director of the PhD program in Architecture (History and Theory), and co-director of the program in Critical, Curatorial and Conceptual Practices in Architecture (CCCP) at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, Columbia University. Her work as a historian and theorist focuses on articulating genealogies of political and theoretical engagement with questions of techno-scientific, environmental, and geopolitical transformation within modern and contemporary architecture, art, and media, as well as upon the discourses, institutions and social movements that have shaped and defined these disciplines, sometimes evidently, sometimes less so.
In addition to publishing numerous articles in journals, magazines, catalogs, and edited anthologies, she has published Architecture or Techno-Utopia: Politics After Modernism (MIT Press, 2007), Living Archive 7: Ant Farm (ACTAR, 2008), Outlaw Territories: Environments of Insecurity/Architectures of Counter-Insurgency (Zone Books, 2016), and Disorientations: Bernard Rudofsky in the Empire of Signs(Sternberg Press, 2016). She is the recipient of many awards, including the German Transatlantic Berlin Prize from the American Academy in Berlin (2013), Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts Grants (2011, 2017), a New York State Council on the Arts Independent Project Award (2010), a Clark Fellowship (2008), an Arts Writers Grant from Creative Capital/Warhol Foundation (2007), a J. Paul Getty Postdoctoral Fellowship (2002-2003), and a Henry Luce/ACLS Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship in American Art (1998-1999). She is also a founding co-editor of Grey Room, a quarterly journal of architecture, art, media, and politics published quarterly by MIT Press since Fall 2000.
Continuing to work at the nexus of architecture, media, politics, and environment, and still focused on institutional frameworks, emergent techno-scientific forces, and social movements, Scott’s research has turned to address mechanisms of global and trans-national governance and the developmental regimes that inform the shifting topology of the so-called Global North and Global South, as well as to trace colonial and neocolonial exploitation and violence in its many forms, including war, resource extraction, racism, and gender inequities. Following her recent book, Outlaw Territories: Environments of Insecurity/Architectures of Counterinsurgency,current research addresses: the environment and video works of Chilean artist and architect Juan Downey; space colonization during the 1970s and the haunting return of attendant ideologies today; a “global” film program affiliated with the UN’s Habitat conference in 1976, and claiming to produce “documents of reality,” “visual statements,” or even a “world picture” under the rubric of “communications development aid”; and (in conjunction with Mark Wasiuta) a research/exhibition project on Cambodia’s “post-colonial” modernization and its violent reversals from the mid-1950s to the late-1980s entitled “Absent Archives, Media Afterlives: New Khmer Environments.
Mark Wasiuta is Lecturer in Architecture at Columbia GSAPP and Co-Director of the Critical, Curatorial and Conceptual Practices in Architecture program.
Wasiuta is the recipient of recent grants from the Graham Foundation, NYSCA and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Recent exhibitions curated and produced with various collaborators include, Environmental Communications: Contact High at the Chicago Architecture Biennial, La Fine Del Mondo at the 14th Architectural Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, Air Manifest: Los Angeles 1955, 1965at Studio X Istanbul in conjunction with the 2nd Istanbul Design Biennial, Deste Fashion Collection 1 to 8 at the Benaki Museum, Athens, and Information Fall-Out: Buckminster Fuller’s World Game at the Arthur Ross Architecture Gallery.
He is co-editor and co-author of Dan Graham’s New Jersey. Forthcoming publications include the books Environments and Counter Environments, Experimental Media in Italy: The New Domestic Landscape and Collecting Architecture Territories. He is partner in the design and research office the International House of Architecture. The office is currently completing a history of the air urbanism of Los Angeles in the context of a postwar cultural and material economy of contamination and purification.
MIT Department of Architecture
Fall 2018 Lecture Series
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Book Talk — Politics with the People: Building a Directly Representative Democracy
WHEN Monday, Dec. 3, 2018, 1 – 2:15 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Ash Center Foyer, Floor 2, Suite 200N, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Ash Center, Harvard Kennedy School
COST Free
CONTACT INFO info@ash.harvard.edu
DETAILS "Politics with the People: Building a Directly Representative Democracy" authors Michael Neblo, Ohio State University; and David Lazer, Northeastern University.
Jill Lepore, Harvard University, will serve as a respondent. Archon Fung, Harvard Kennedy School, will moderate. Lunch will be served.
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Beyond Biofeedback and Towards Machine Based Learning in Treating the Extremities of Post-Stroke Survivors
WHEN Monday, Dec. 3, 2018, 3 – 4 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Maxwell Dworkin (G115), Robert and Nadia Lessin Forum, 33 Oxford Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Wyss Institute at Harvard University
SPEAKER(S) Steven L. Wolf, Ph.D., FAPTA, FAHA, FASNR Professor, Departments of Rehabilitation Medicine (Physical Therapy Education Division), Medicine and Cell Biology, Emory University School of Medicine; Senior Research Scientist and Associate Director for Research, Center for Visual and Neurocognitive Rehabilitation, Atlanta VA Health Care System
CONTACT INFO events@wyss.harvard.edu
DETAILS This presentation highlights the evolution of biofeedback for stroke movement retraining and projects the use of telerehabilitation and biosensing technologies into the future treatment of stroke survivors.
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The State of Online Speech and Governance
WHEN Monday, Dec. 3, 2018, 3:30 – 4:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Law School, Wasserstein Hall (Room 2004), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Ethics, Information Technology, Law, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
SPEAKER(S) Monika Bickert, Head of Global Policy Management at Facebook
Jonathan Zittrain, The George Bemis Professor of International Law at Harvard Law School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government
COST Free - RSVP Required
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The Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the Childhood Roots of Social Mobility (IDSS Distinguished Speaker Seminar:)
Monday, December 3
4:00pm to 5:00pm
MIT, Building 32-155, 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
Abstract: We construct a publicly available atlas of children’s outcomes in adulthood by Census tract using anonymized longitudinal data covering nearly the entire U.S. population. For each tract, we estimate children’s earnings distributions, incarceration rates, and other outcomes in adulthood by parental income, race, and gender. These estimates allow us to trace the roots of outcomes such as poverty and incarceration back to the neighborhoods in which children grew up. We find that children’s outcomes vary sharply across nearby areas: for children of parents at the 25th percentile of the income distribution, the standard deviation of mean household income at age 35 is $5,000 across tracts within counties. We illustrate how these tract-level data can provide insight into how neighborhoods shape the development of human capital and support local economic policy using two applications. First, the estimates permit precise targeting of policies to improve economic opportunity by uncovering specific neighborhoods where certain subgroups of children grow up to have poor outcomes. Neighborhoods matter at a very granular level: conditional on characteristics such as poverty rates in a child’s own Census tract, characteristics of tracts that are one mile away have little predictive power for a child’s outcomes. Our historical estimates are informative predictors of outcomes even for children growing up today because neighborhood conditions are relatively stable over time. Second, we show that the observational estimates are highly predictive of neighborhoods’ causal effects, based on a comparison to data from the Moving to Opportunity experiment and a quasi-experimental research design analyzing movers’ outcomes. We then identify high-opportunity neighborhoods that are affordable to low-income families, providing an input into the design of affordable housing policies. Our measures of children’s long-term outcomes are only weakly correlated with traditional proxies for local economic success such as rates of job growth, showing that the conditions that create greater upward mobility are not necessarily the same as those that lead to productive labor markets.
About the Speaker: Raj Chetty is the William A. Ackman Professor of Economics at Harvard University. He is also the Director of the Equality of Opportunity Project, which uses “big data” to understand how we can give children from disadvantaged backgrounds better chances of succeeding. Chetty’s research combines empirical evidence and economic theory to help design more effective government policies. His work on topics ranging from tax policy and unemployment insurance to education and affordable housing has been widely cited in academia, media outlets, and Congressional testimony.
Chetty received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2003 and is one of the youngest tenured professors in Harvard’s history. Before joining the faculty at Harvard, he was a professor at UC-Berkeley and Stanford University. Chetty has received numerous awards for his research, including a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship and the John Bates Clark medal, given to the economist under 40 whose work is judged to have made the most significant contribution to the field.
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Behind the Midterm Data: Understanding Political Realignment in the U.S.
WHEN Monday, Dec. 3, 2018, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Ash Center Foyer, Floor 2, Suite 200N, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, Harvard Kennedy School
SPEAKER(S) Laura Quinn, Ash Center Democracy Visiting Fellow of Practice, Catalist CEO and co-founder
COST Free
CONTACT INFO info@ash.harvard.edu
DETAILS Join us for a conversation with Ash Center Democracy Visiting Fellow of Practice Laura Quinn, Catalist CEO and co-founder, who will provide an overview and insight into the data from the 2018 midterm elections. Bring your questions about demographic and geographic trends and what the midterm results portend for 2020 and beyond. Archon Fung, Winthrop Laflin McCormack Professor of Citizenship and Self-Government, Harvard Kennedy School, will moderate.
Refreshments will be served.
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This Ain’t Normal: Film Screening & Discussion
WHEN Monday, Dec. 3, 2018, 5:30 – 8 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Law School, Ames Courtroom, Austin Hall, 1515 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Film
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice
SPEAKER(S) Rudy Hypolite, Film Producer and Director
Dennis Wilson, Film Producer
Conan Harris, Deputy Director of Public Safety for the City of Boston
Donnell Singleton, CEO of Origin Nile Publishing
Donald M. Osgood, Sr., Advocate, Louis D. Brown Peace Institute
COST Free and open to the public
DETAILS This documentary film depicts the stories of gang-involved youth, entangled in the intractable violence haunting Boston’s neighborhoods, and the StreetSafe Boston social and street workers tasked with helping to transform their lives. "This Ain’t Normal" examines the individual circumstances behind the violence, thereby gaining a deeper insight and understanding into the issue of youth violence, as it has grown to epidemic proportions in the City on the Hill and in the nation.
Film screening followed by discussion. Pizza will be provided.
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Joan Jonas and Sung Hwan Kim: In Conversation
Monday, December 3
6:00pm to 7:30pm
MIT, Building E14: Media Lab, 3rd Floor, 75 Amherst Street, Cambridge
ACT’s Professor Emerita, Joan Jonas, and alumnus, Sung Hwan Kim, will be together in conversation with ACT Director, Judith Barry. This event will honor Jonas’ contribution to ACT, and highlight the re-emergence of a performance art course at ACT, to be taught by Kim in Spring 2019.
Respondents:
Jay Scheib, Professor in Theater, Music And Theater Arts Department, MIT
Karthik Pandian, Assistant Professor of Visual and Environmental Studies, Department of Visual and Environmental Studies, Harvard
Part of the Fall 2018 Lecture Series: Vibrant Signs and Indeterminant Matter(s)
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SPI December Discussion: Micro-mobility
Monday, December 3
6:00pm to 7:30pm
MIT, Building 56-162, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
In July of this year, a fleet of electric scooters appeared on the streets of Cambridge and Somerville. A few weeks later, the scooters disappeared as the cities threatened to confiscate them. It was a local sign of a global shift in the way that people travel short distances, as numerous companies in recent years have begun to offer micro-mobility services such as dockless bikes and electric scooters that can be unlocked with an app. How far should cities go to make room for such services? How does micro-mobility fit in with the recent rise of ride-hailing and car-sharing services in revolutionizing “last-mile transportation”? Join the Science Policy Initiative for our monthly meeting at 6 pm on Monday, 12/3 in Room 56-162 as we discuss these and other questions over dinner.
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ONLINE SHOPPING: FRIEND OR FOE?
Monday, December 3
6:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Alley powered by Verizon, 10 Ware Street, Cambridge
Advances in technology have revolutionized the way we shop. Instead of prowling the mall, hailing cabs, and perusing produce sections, from the comfort of our home we push a button and goods appear. Yet the changes in the retail landscape are far from linear. Just when we thought the future was online, Amazon launched brick-and-mortar stores. Data security issues at Facebook and elsewhere have us rethinking which desires we divulge online. And scandals at Uber remind us that disruptive digital enterprises have dark sides, too. As the holiday shopping season unfolds in America, it’s worth it to pause and reflect: What do we want from retail? Where is it going and why?
Join Civic Series for an in-depth conversation about the future of retail and come away with clarity on:
Why brick-and-mortar stores will survive the digital era
What consumers gain and lose by shopping online
Strategic choices of Blue Apron, Amazon
What to expect from stores this holiday season [how to make shopping work for you]
This session will feature a presentation by MIT Senior Lecturer of Marketing, Sharmila Chatterjee, and plenty of time for questions and answers.
We’ll kick off around 6:15pm followed by 30-40 of presentation and 30 minutes of Q&A. Plus free snacks and beer! Thank you again to Alley powered by Verizon for hosting!
Sharmila C. Chatterjee is a Senior Lecturer in Marketing and the Academic Head for the MBA Track in Enterprise Management (EM) at MIT Sloan. Chatterjee teaches the graduate course in B2B Marketing and is deeply engaged in Action Learning as a faculty mentor for G-Lab, China/India Lab, and as an instructor for the Enterprise Management (EM) Lab. Her research explores sales-marketing interface, customer acquisition and retention, the diffusion of technological innovations, value based management, brand trust, financial literacy and multicultural marketing. Chatterjee has published in Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Retailing, among others, and is an award winning case writer. Chatterjee graduated from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS), Pilani and worked briefly in Faridabad, India before earning her Ph.D. in Marketing from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
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Solving Our Climate Crisis: A National Town Hall
Monday, December 3
7 PM – 8:30 PM
TO WATCH ONLINE: Go to www.facebook.com/senatorsanders at 7 PM ET on December 3rd.
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) will host a national town hall on Monday, Dec. 3, aimed at addressing the global threat of climate change and exploring solutions that can protect the planet from devastation and create tens of millions of good-paying jobs.
Sanders will be joined by 350.org founder and author Bill McKibben; actress, activist and Our Revolution board member Shailene Woodley; CNN host and author Van Jones; Congresswoman-Elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY); Earth Guardians Youth Director Xiuhtezcatl Martinez; Union of Concerned Scientists Director of Climate Science Dr. Brenda Ekwurzel; Dale Ross, mayor of Georgetown, Texas; and Dr. Camilla Bausch, President of Ecologic Institute.
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The Future of Transportation: Autonomy and Interdependence
Monday, December 3, 2018
7:00 PM to 9:00 PM
The Venture Cafe at the Cambridge Innovation Center, One Broadway, 5th Floor, Kendall Square, Cambridge
Doors open @ 6pm -- Come early and meet other Long Now thinkers -- Presentation starts @ 7pm
RSVP at https://futureoftransportinterdependence.eventbrite.com [CIC members use your discount at Eventbrite; Students must use Eventbrite because we can't set up student tickets here]
A Long Now Boston Community Conversation with
Robin Chase, Transportation Entrepreneur, Co-Founder of Zipcar
Hollywood and the comic books get it all wrong. There are no flying cars. Yet.
The movie Minority Report (2002) offered an interesting vision of urban transportation, with self-driving hover cars moving on multi-tiered 3D highways at high speeds – all fully interconnected and (it turns out) fully controlled by an untrustworthy bureaucracy. According to Robin Chase, the co-founder of Zipcar and Veniam and a leading visionary on the shared economy, that image is comically flawed.
Join the Long Now Boston conversation as Robin Chase shares her perspective on the not too distant future of transportation technology, and the roadmap we need to follow to get there.
Among the topics we'll explore through a Long Now lens:
What technology innovations will be fundamental to the movement of people and goods in the future?
What are the institutional challenges we are going to have to solve to achieve smarter, cleaner transportation systems?
How do current policies and regulatory frameworks stifle innovation and reward complacency --- and how do we fix them?
What changes in infrastructure investments, and even in capitalism itself, are needed to enable more sustainable, adaptive and resilient transportation systems?
Join the conversation and be part of the solution.
$15 in advance // $20 at the door. Students w/ID admitted free.
Audience participation is encouraged.
The Long Now Boston Conversation Series hosts leading transportation entrepreneur, Robin Chase to share her vision for a future where transportation is optimized for human needs. The opportunities are closer than you think.
Robin Chase is a leading transportation entrepreneur. The co-founder and former CEO of Zipcar, she also founded Buzzcar, a peer-to-peer car sharing service, and GoLoco, a ride-sharing company, and is co-founder of Veniam, a vehicle network communications company. In 2015, she authored, Peers Inc: How People and Platforms are Inventing the Collaborative Economy and Reinventing Capitalism (2015). Robin is a graduate of Wellesley College (B.A.), and the MIT Sloan School of Management (M.B.A.), and won a Loeb Fellowship at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. She is a popular speaker and presenter, and serves as a Board member for the World Resources Institute.
We’re proud and excited to welcome Robin to the Long Now Boston community.
Cambridge Innovation Center is an in-kind sponsor of this Long Now Boston conversation. We are very grateful for their support.
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Tuesday, December 4
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Thesis Defense: Computational Analysis of the Biophysical Controls on Southern Ocean Phytoplankton Ecosystem Dynamics
Tuesday, December 4
11:00am to 12:00pm
MIT, Building 54-915, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
Tyler Rohr
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“My Constellation is Space”: Towards a Theory of Black Cyberculture
WHEN Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2018, 12 – 1:15 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Law School, Wasserstein Hall, Milstein West B (Room 2019, Second Floor), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Ethics, Information Technology, Law, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
SPEAKER(S) Dr. André L. Brock
COST Free - RSVP Required
TICKET WEB LINK https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/2018-12-04/my-constellation-space-towards-theory-black-cyberculture
DETAILS Technology is the American mythos (Dinerstein 2006); a belief system powering the relations between — and politics of — culture and technology. In the Western context, technoculture incorporates whiteness, white racial ideology, and modernist technological beliefs. This presentation is a critical intervention for internet research and science and technology studies (STS), reorienting “race-as-technology” (Chun 2009) to incorporate Blackness as technological subjects rather than as “things."
Utilizing critical technocultural discourse analysis (Brock 2018), Afro-optimism, and libidinal economic theory, this presentation employs Black Twitter as an exemplar of Black cyberculture: digital practice and artifacts informed by a Black aesthetic.
LINK https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/2018-12-04/my-constellation-space-towards-theory-black-cyberculture
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Webinar: What's a Green New Deal?
Tuesday, December 4
1:00 PM
Momentum is building for a Green New Deal: a big, bold transformation of the economy to tackle the twin crises of inequality and climate change. What exactly is a Green New Deal, and how can we help make it a reality? Join our Green New Deal webinar for Sierra Club staff and volunteers on December 4th at 1pm ET, hosted by our Living Economy program: Register here.
This webinar will spotlight local Green New Deal progress that's already underway across the country. From coast to coast, broad local coalitions -- including Sierra Club chapters -- are advancing economic policies that create family-sustaining jobs, slash climate pollution, and build resilience, with benefits flowing first and foremost to frontline communities. With newly-elected members of Congress now elevating the call for a national Green New Deal, we'll discuss opportunities to fuel the momentum in the coming year.
Jacob Stern jacob.stern@sierraclub.org (617) 423-5775
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RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN SOIL MICROBIAL PHYSIOLOGY, COMMUNITY COMPOSITION AND CARBON AND NITROGEN CYCLING IN TEMPERATE FOREST ECOSYSTEMS
Tuesday, December 4
1:00 pm
BU, 24 Cummington Mall, Room 103, Boston
GRS Dissertation Defense of Mustafa Saifuddin
Contact Name Tyler Wasson
Phone617-353-2696
Contact Email grsrec@bu.edu
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Climate change and food security in the Asia-Pacific: Response and resilience
Tuesday, December 4
2:30pm to 3:30pm
MIT, Building 66-360, 25 Ames Street, Cambridge
Join visiting scholar Md. Saidul Islam from Nanyang Technological University Singapore for the third event in his guest lecture series. Climate change is putting a large strain on food production, and that pressure is on track to increase. Come hear Professor Islam discuss regional initiatives and future resilience in regard to climate change's impact on food security in the Asia-Pacific.
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Will solid-state batteries compete with liquid-based Li-ion technology?
Tuesday, December 4
3:30pm to 4:30pm
MIT, Building 66-110, 25 Ames Street, Cambridge
The Materials Science and Engineering Seminar Series presents Prof. Jeff Sakamoto from the University of Michigan.
Abstract: There is tremendous interest in making the next super battery, but Li-ion technology works so well and has inertia in several commercial markets. Supplanting Li-ion will be difficult. Recent breakthroughs in Li metal solid-state electrolytes could enable a new class of non-combustible solid-state batteries (SSB) with twice the energy density (1,200 Wh/l) compared to Li-ion. However, technological and manufacturing challenges remain. The discussion will consist of recent milestones and knowledge gaps to include:
Stability and kinetics of the Li metal-solid electrolyte interface
Understanding and controlling an unusual phenomenon: Li metal penetration in solid electrolytes; how can something soft penetrate something hard?
Solid-state mechanics of Li metal and composite ceramic electrodes
Despite the challenges, SSB technology is rapidly progressing. Multi-disciplinary research in the fields of materials science, solid-state electrochemistry, and solid-state mechanics will play an important role in determining if SSB will make the lab-to-market transition.
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The Meaning of the Midterms: Who Counted? Who Voted?
WHEN Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2018, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
SPEAKER(S) Aimee Allison, president, Democracy in Color
Katherine J. Cramer, professor of political science, University of Wisconsin - Madison
Sarah Lenti, CEO, director, and board secretary, Serve America Movement
Robert O. Self RI ’08, Mary Ann Lippitt Professor of American History, Brown University
Moderated by Asma Khalid, political reporter, NPR
COST Free
CONTACT INFO events@radcliffe.harvard.edu
DETAILS The year 2018 will be remembered for its surge in women's candidacies. Whether through individual, high-profile victories or the sheer force of hundreds upon hundreds of women standing for office, this electoral cycle has reflected options at the local, state, and national levels that are starkly different from any that Americans have confronted before at the ballot box. Whatever the outcomes of the November elections, the role of women, as well as of people of color, immigrants, and other historically underrepresented groups, will be pivotal.
This panel will offer an analysis of the election results through a diverse set of perspectives — academic, experiential, gendered, generational, geographic, and political — to enhance our understanding of the midterms.
Register online.
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Asian Americans and Affirmative Action Policy
Tuesday, December 4
4:30pm
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Van C. Tran, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Columbia University, is a sociologist whose research and writing broadly focus on the incorporation of Asian and Latino immigrants and their children, as well as its implications for American culture, politics and society. Within this area, his contribution lies in the study of the immigrant second generation (i.e. children of immigrants born in the U.S.) and how ethnic neighborhoods and cultural processes shape social mobility among second-generation Asian and Latino/a Americans.
His research has been published in both sociology and interdisciplinary journals, including Social Forces, International Migration Review, Ethnic and Racial Studies, City & Community, Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, and The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. His scholarship has been recognized with awards from the Section on International Migration, Section on Latino/a Sociology and Section on Community and Urban Sociology of the American Sociological Association.
Tran was born in Vietnam and grew up in Thailand before resettling in New York City as a refugee in 1998. He developed his interest in immigration and urban inequality as an observer of the city’s many diverse communities.
Free and open to the public | Refreshments will be served
Sponsored by the Inter-University Committee on International Migration
The Inter-University Committee on International Migration
Since its establishment in 1974, the Inter-University Committee on International Migration has been a focal point for migration and refugee studies at member institutions, which include Boston University, Brandeis University, The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Harvard University, MIT, Tufts University, and Wellesley College. The committee is chaired by MIT as a program of the Center for International Studies (CIS).
Migration Seminar Series
During each academic year, the Committee sponsors a seminar series on international migration, The Myron Weiner Seminar Series on International Migration, held at MIT's Center for International Studies. The seminars explore factors affecting international population movements and their impact upon sending and receiving countries and relations among them.
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Startup R&D Demo Day
Tuesday, December 4
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM EST
Harvard, Pierce Hall, 29 Oxford Street, Room 301, Cambridge
Come meet our student-innovators, learn about their startups, and hear the latest ideas that are making waves in our world. Their startups span the Nutritional Science, AI, FinTech, Blockchain and beyond. Boston entrepreneurs, innovators, investors, and students interested in joining startups will be in attendance. Explore teams' presentations, speak one-on-one with the founders, and enjoy great food.
Teams are from ES95r: Startup R & D course at the Harvard School of Engineering. View a preview of the presenting teams at https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1uPFgVFwli-jfKic3xTJIJ5DfdJUHrhWQAjjtj6fJSzc/
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Azov Sea: A Winter War?
WHEN Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2018, 4:30 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, CGIS South Building, Belfer Case Study Room (S020), 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Co-sponsored by the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute.
SPEAKER(S) Timothy Colton, Morris and Anna Feldberg Professor of Government and Russian Studies, Harvard University
Dmitry Gorenburg, Senior Research Scientist, CNA
Oxana Shevel, Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, Tufts University
CONTACT INFO 617-495-4037
DETAILS On Nov. 25, Russia accused three Ukrainian vessels of violating Russian territorial waters as they crossed the Kerch Strait under the newly built Russian bridge to Crimea. Ukraine called the attack an “act of aggression,” and its parliament approved a 30-day martial law in territories bordering the Sea of Azov and Russia. The U.N. Secretary-General has urged for “maximum restraint” even as Russia has detained the Ukrainian sailors.
Will there be a Winter War in the Sea of Azov? This panel will discuss the underlying reasons for Russian aggression, and how the situation is likely to develop.
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Start-Up Nation Tech Fair at Northeastern University
Tuesday, December 4
5:30 PM – 8:00 PM EST
Northeastern, Curry Student Center, 260 Huntington Avenue, Boston
The Start-Up Nation Technology Fair at Northeastern University is a professionally organized expo floor featuring early-stage Israeli companies exhibiting innovative products and technologies. The fair also features internship and employment opportunities with the exhibiting Israeli companies, a LinkedIn photobooth, raffle prizes and more.
Explore Israeli technology, meet innovators, and acquire internships at this incredible event.
FREE! Walk-ins Welcome!
For more information, please visit:
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Cleantech Capital: Funding the Energy Future
Tuesday, December 4
5:30pm to 8:30pm
Wolf Greenfield, 600 Atlantic Avenue, Boston
Cost: $5 - $30
This event will be live streamed
Fundraising is challenging, particularly in the cleantech space. However, the sector has seen a recent increase in startup funding and corporate interest that has been coupled with a desire for more digital, distributed, and resilient solutions. Join us for a primer on energy fundraising – a panel of cleantech investors will discuss their approach to investing from initial pitch and diligence to investment and long-term engagement. Investors will also share their perspectives on why the market is ripe for energy innovation, highlighting emerging energy technologies and trends that are attractive in the venture space. You will gain insight into how to engage with investors as an early-stage company, and how investors can add value and serve as strategic partners beyond funding.
Join us to learn where to start, what to look for, who to reach out to, how to reach out, what processes to anticipate, and how to work with your investors.
Moderator
Kathryn Meng Elmes, Investment Associate, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center
Panel
Matthew Nordan, Co-founder, PRIME Coalition, Managing Director, PRIME Impact Fund
Ally Yost, Associate, The Engine
Patrick Walsh, Investment Director, National Grid Corporate Development
Christina Karapataki, Investor, Breakthrough Energy Ventures
Event Schedule
5:30-6:00 Registration and networking
6:00-7:30 Welcome and panel discussion
7:30-8:30 Networking
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From Boston to Yorktown: Tales of the National Trails
Tuesday, December 4
6:00 PM – 7:30 PM EST
John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Columbia Point, Boston
In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the National Trails Act of 1968, Nathaniel Philbrick, author of In the Hurricane’s Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown, and other panelists explore key events at historic sites featured in National Historic Trails and National Recreation Trails.
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Race, Political Solidarity & the Future of America
Tuesday, December 4
6:00 PM – 8:00 PM EST
Northeastern, Interdisciplinary Science & Engineering Complex (ISEC) Auditorium, 805 Columbus Avenue, ISEC 102 - Auditorium, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/race-political-solidarity-the-future-of-america-tickets-52541821001
A talk with Dr. Theodore R. Johnson, discussing the history of black political behavior by looking at race, party and income.
Over the last decade, the feeling among Americans is that race relations have progressively worsened. From riots following the killing of unarmed black men to white nationalists marching to protest the growing racial diversity in the United States, the majority of Americans fear the nation is reaching a tipping point. Either we address the race question head on or we risk the collapse of our democracy.
In this talk, Dr. Theodore R. Johnson proposes that the most effective approach to overcoming the effects of racism is the establishment of a national solidarity among the American people. This solidarity is centered on notions of civil religion and is the means to ensure our liberal democracy endures. Moreover, Johnson argues that the model for national solidarity is the political solidarity found within black America.
Racism is an existential threat to the United States and the American idea. Solidarity is required to ensure the American experiment succeeds.
Dr. Theodore R. Johnson is a public policy scholar and military veteran. He writes and speaks on issues of social justice, race, and politics, as well as cybersecurity and national security. He holds a Doctorate of Law and Policy from Northeastern University, where his research focused on African American political and voting behavior was awarded the Dean’s Medal for Outstanding Doctoral Work.
Dr. Johnson has more than 15 years of public policy experience in federal departments and agencies, including as a White House Fellow where he served as the Cyber Advisor to the Deputy Secretary of the Department of Energy undertaking cybersecurity initiatives to secure the nation’s electric grid. A retired naval officer, he served as a cybersecurity expert, a Speechwriter to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon, and as a military aide to the Director of the National Security Agency, among other assignments.
His work has appeared in the The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and a number of other publications writing primarily on issues of race relations, public policy, and current national news topics. He’s also appeared on MSNBC, CNN, and NPR talk radio discussing racial justice and public policy.
He is currently working on a book titled "When the Stars Begin to Fall: Race, Solidarity, and the Future of America", and it will be published by Grove Atlantic in 2020.
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Future of Work: Will Artificial Intelligence and Robots Replace Humans or Create New Job Types?
Tuesday, December 4
6:00-8:00 pm
Seaport World Trade Center, 200 Seaport Boulevard, ROOM: BEACON HILL, Boston
Cost: $15
Imagine a world where artificial intelligence-assisted healthcare professionals will be able to diagnose, prescribe and treat humans and animals. Robotic assistants will help the elderly or disabled, cost-efficiently. Robots with human attributes will follow voice commands. Trainable robots will be the norm and collaborative robots or co-bots will make people work more effectively and efficiently.
In reality, this will be our world in the very near future. As chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov says—we should be thinking of intelligent machines as augmented intelligence vs artificial intelligence.
The panelists will discuss:
The future of artificial intelligenceEmerging technologies and their impact on society
Role of Intelligent machines and chatbots - at home and in business
and more. . .
Note: Come early and network. Use the AI World Expo pass to access the entire Expo hall, startup pavilion, and technology solutions theater
Featured Speakers
Bethany Plaza, VP, IT Services, RCM Technologies
For 25 years, Bethany Plaza has been an energetic and outspoken leader in the IT industry. She has played a pivotal role in helping individuals and business thrive while solving Technology challenges. Drawing on her unique blend of solutions-oriented, strategic thinking, and person-centered leadership development, she has helped a wide range of organizations meet and exceed their goals in business.
Bethany has owned and sold five companies-most recently she sold her IT Services company to a publicly traded company-RCM Technologies, Inc. She now heads up the IT-professional services divisions-to support the most cutting-edge technologies-including AI, Security, and HCM solutions.
Bethany is a master of team dynamics and recognized as a change leader in the ever-evolving IT industry. Bethany is able to help leaders develop cohesive models that value and integrate the myriad skill sets located within the organization.
More than a savvy professional, Bethany is a leader of leaders. While her clients regularly need help in the mechanics of developing a successful organization, they also need wise companions to motivate and guide them; to instill hope and confidence in otherwise uncertain circumstances. Bethany makes it her mission to help these individuals find success and fulfillment for both their businesses and themselves.
Bethany also serves as a National Director for Women in Technology, International. WITI's mission is to empower women worldwide to achieve unimagined possibilities and transformations through technology, leadership, and economic prosperity.
Stephen Pappas, head of North American operation and senior vice president, Panviva
Steve has built a career-transforming, customer experience. By taking a 360-degree view of the customer, Steve makes sure each employee has the actionable knowledge necessary to make better decisions and serve customers in a way that increases loyalty, referrals, sales, and satisfaction.
In his role with Panviva, the omnichannel knowledge cloud company, Steve consults with hundreds of companies annually on their CX strategies. Industry associations, publications, and Fortune 500 companies invite him to speak and write about CX best practices in healthcare, finance, utilities, insurance, and telecommunications.
A successful entrepreneur in his own right, Steve has built and sold six companies. Each company has held to the mantra of "the customer is at the center of the universe." When he is not driving CX strategy, Steve plays the guitar and mentors young entrepreneurs. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife and sons.
Parna Sarkar-Basu, CEO and Founder, Brand and Buzz Marketing
Parna Sarkar-Basu, a tech advocate, helps companies navigate the digital era and created the robot technology category and ecosystem along with the founders of iRobot.
Leveraging her two passions - technology and brand building - Parna humanizes corporate brands, builds thought leaders, simplifies the complex and creates industry buzz to elevate companies to new heights. She has been instrumental in propelling tech companies into innovation leaders in highly competitive markets, including artificial intelligence, enterprise software, storage systems, robots, agtech, health tech, and mobile.
Recipient of multiple awards, Parna has led marketing and communications functions for various global companies, including Kaminario, iRobot, iCorps Technologies, Invention Machine (acquired by IHS), and PTC. She now serves as a strategic advisor to entrepreneurs and CEOs in the United States, and Europe, and works with their team on a variety of initiatives, including corporate and product positioning, new market entry, innovation marketing, and digital transformation.
She appears frequently as a speaker at key local and industry events - from innovation and entrepreneurship to tech trends and emerging technologies. Parna also serves as the VP of marketing for WITI (Women in Technology International).
Ying Chen, Chief Product Officer, Luminoso
As the Chief Product Officer of Luminoso Technologies, Ying Chen leads product design and development for the firm's portfolio of products focused on artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language understanding (NLU). Prior to joining Luminoso, Ying has spent decades leading Fortune 1000 organizations and VC-backed startups to deliver award-winning product solutions that have resulted in these organizations grow in their existing market while pivot into new ones.
Most recently, Ying led the global go-to-market and strategy at Pegasystems for the firm's digital process automation platform, including launching new capabilities such as robotic automation and intelligent virtual assistants. She is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and contributor to publications on topics related to digital transformation, technology trends such as chatbots, and product management.
Ying holds a bachelor's of science degree from Carnegie Mellon University and a master's degree in business administration from Boston University.
David Clear, V.P. Business Development, Vecna Robotics
David Clear is Vice President of Business Development at Vecna Robotics. He leads the Business Development team in bringing Vecna Robotics' flexible and agile autonomous solutions to the warehouse and logistics market. Clear cultivates strategic partnerships with global fortune 500 companies, privately held organizations, and government agencies. Before joining Vecna, Clear worked in the retail and logistics industry, overseeing process improvement and auditing throughout Lidl Ireland GmbH network and leading Loss Prevention at Heatons Stores. Clear went on to spend five-plus years consulting with start-ups and SMEs on expansion, marketing, product, and fundraising strategies. He holds master degrees in Business Administration and Philosophy- Operational Risk Management from the University of Glasgow's Adam Smith School of Business.
Schedule of Events
6:00 p.m. - Registration, Networking, and Appetizers
6:20 p.m. - WITI Overview and Speaker Introduction
6:30 p.m. - Program and Discussion
7:15 p.m. - Raffle Prizes!
8:00 p.m. - Adjourn
Meeting Notes
A light supper and beverages are provided
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Defining the future of jobs in the midst of AI revolution
Tuesday, December 4
6:30 PM to 8:00 PM
Seaport World Trade Center, 1 Seaport Lane, Harborview 2 Room, Boston
AI is disrupting every aspect of our lives. Ever wonder how is it impacting our future of jobs and work and how businesses are preparing themselves to take advantage of this new trend. In this panel, Boston's finest startups that are disrupting and defining the future of jobs/work landscape will come together and share their insights. This is a must attend conversation about the future of jobs in the midst of AI revolution. Future of work is changing rapidly and its success criteria is also getting redefined. Come and join one of the most important conversation of our professional lives. This session would be a glimpse into what is happening in work space, how our jobs would transform in the future and how we could change to cope up. There would be insights on how to best navigate our trajectory so we are always relevant and have access to relevant resources in this disrupting future.
Moderator: Vishal Kumar, CEO/President AnalyticsWeek
Panelists:
Scott Jamison, CEO at AskHR
Rob May, CEO at Talla
Ram Katamaraja, Co-founder at Refactored.ai
Akash Savdharia, CEO at Patheer
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The Ethics of Species Conservation
Tuesday, December 4
7:00–8:15pm
Arnold Arboretum, Hunnewell Building
RSVP at https://my.arboretum.harvard.edu/Policies.aspx or call 617-384-5277
Cost: $0 - $10
Ronald Sandler, PhD, Chair and Professor of Philosophy; Director, Ethics Institute, Northeastern University
Rapid ecological change, and climate change in particular, poses challenges to traditional conservation paradigms and strategies. It has also led some conservationists to endorse novel conservation techniques, such as assisted colonization, gene drives and even de-extinction. This talk will explore the values and philosophies that underlie species conservation under conditions of rapid change. It will ask us to think about what is valuable about species and why we ought to try to conserve them.
Ronald Sandler is the author of the following books: Environmental Ethics (2017, Oxford University Press), Food Ethics (2014, Routledge), The Ethics of Species (2012, Cambridge University Press), Ethics and Emerging Technologies (2013, Palgrave Macmillan), and Character and Environment (2007, Columbia University Press).
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Boston’s Pre-Revolutionary Newspaper Wars (and What They May Tell Us About Today’s News Media
Tuesday, December 4
7-9 p.m.
The Loring Greenough House, 12 South Street, Boston
Cost: $5 – $10
A presentation by J. L. Bell, author & historian
A "Tuesday in the Parlor" series lecture.
In the period leading up to the Revolution, colonial journalists produced a lively array of print publications aimed at keeping the populace informed about—or inflamed by—the political news of the day. On the left were The Boston Gazette and The Massachusetts Spy while The Boston News-Letter, The Boston Chronicle, and Boston Weekly Post-Boy espoused viewpoints from the right. The Boston Evening-Post tried to maintain a centrist voice. The newspaper business could be a nasty and dangerous one, prompting rivalries between printers and occasional violence.
Join us for J. L. Bell’s enlightening talk about the how America’s early news medium operated in the volatile pre-Revolutionary environment and the significance of this history for today’s information media.
J. L. Bell specializes in history, analysis, and unabashed gossip about the start of the American Revolution in Massachusetts. His book The Road to Concord: How Four Stolen Cannon Ignited the Revolutionary War will be available for purchase at the presentation.
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Wednesday, December 5
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BEING SERIOUSLY ILL IN THE U.S.: Financial and Healthcare Impacts | Forum
WHEN Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2018, 12 – 1 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Chan School of Public Health, Leadership Studio, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR The Forum at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
SPEAKER(S) Toyin Ajayi, Chief Health Officer and Co-Founder, Cityblock
Robert Blendon, Professor of Health Policy and Political Analysis, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Harvard Kennedy School
Robert Master, Founder and Former President and Chief Executive Officer, Commonwealth Care Alliance
Eric Schneider, Senior Vice President for Policy and Research, The Commonwealth Fund
Moderator:
Margot Sanger-Katz, Correspondent, The New York Times
COST Free
TICKET WEB LINK https://harvard.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cRMkCS2SoWGxRmR
CONTACT INFO Theforum@hsph.harvard.edu
DETAILS What is it like to be seriously ill in America today? From heavy financial burdens (despite insurance), to varied hospital experiences, to impacts on caregivers, people with serious illnesses shared their experiences through a recent poll by the New York Times, the Commonwealth Fund, and the Harvard Chan School. The findings carry significant implications for national debates on basic health insurance requirements and on the reach of programs such as Medicare. In this Forum, a panel of experts will unpack the poll findings, as well as explore practical ways in which health systems can change to help the most ill Americans.
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Pulse of the People: Rap Music and Black Politics
WHEN Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2018, 12 – 1:30 p.m.
WHERE Hiphop Archive & Research Institute, 104 Mount Auburn Street, Floor 3R, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Humanities, Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute at the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research
SPEAKER(S) Lakeyta M. Bonnette-Bailey, Associate Professor, Political Science, Georgia State University
COST Free and open to the public.
CONTACT INFO hutchevents@fas.harvard.edu
DETAILS Dr. Lakeyta Bonnette-Bailey, is an associate professor at Georgia State University in the Political Science Department. Her research interests include Hip Hop culture, political behavior, political attitudes, African-American politics, political psychology and public opinion.
She completed her doctoral degree in the Department of Political Science at The Ohio State University, where her research examined the political impact of rap music on Black political attitudes.
Dr. Bonnette-Bailey has written numerous articles and book chapters including her book, published (2015) with the University of Pennsylvania Press entitled, Pulse of the People: Rap Music and Black Political Attitudes. In 2017 she hosted the first political Hip Hop conference at Georgia State University entitled, Behind the Music: Hip Hop and Social Justice, which examined the ways in which social justice is addressed and expressed within Hip Hop culture.
Dr. Bonnette-Bailey currently teaches classes on American government, Black women and politics, Black political behavior, Black politics, Hip-Hop and politics, racial attitudes and identity politics.
As a Nasir Jones Hiphop Fellow at the Hiphop Archive Research Institute for Fall 2018, she will work on What's on Your Radio?: Political Rap Music and Racial Attitudes.
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"Likely to Become a Public Charge": Federal Immigration Policy and the Health of Our Communities
WHEN Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2018, 4 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Gordon Hall, Waterhouse Room, 25 Shattuck Street, Boston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Health Sciences, Law, Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Office for Diversity Inclusion & Community Partnership; co-sponsor: Latino Medical Student Association at Harvard Medical School
SPEAKER(S) Justin J. Lowe, J.D., Legal Director, Health Law Advocates
COST Free
TICKET WEB LINK https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ESJ_12-5-18
CONTACT INFO Jackie Wright
617-432-2645
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Prices versus Quantities Reassessed
Wednesday, December 5
4:15PM TO 5:30PM
Harvard, Littauer Building, L-382, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Larry Karp, University of California, Berkeley, and Christian Traeger, University of Oslo.
Support from Enel Endowment for Environmental Economics and the Department of Economics is Gratefully Acknowledged.
Seminar in Environmental Economics and Policy
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Resourcing The World, Allison Porter, Veolia North America
Wednesday, December 5
4:30 PM – 6:00 PM EST
Hult International Business School, 1 Education Street, Cambridge
Veolia Environment S.A., branded as Veolia, is a French transnational company with activities in four main service and utility areas water management, waste management, transport and energy services.
HiGET Club is a Hult Int’l Green Energy Team, engaged in promoting renewable energies in all sectors of our life, including wind, solar, hydrogen, energy storage etc. Believe, we can make LESS carbon.
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Energy for a Changing World – An Introduction to Shell Technology Centre Bangalore
Wednesday, December 5
5:00pm to 6:30pm
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Info Session and Networking Event
Shell Technology Centre Bangalore is one of Shell’s three research hubs, the other two being in Houston and Amsterdam. Staff at these centers work on a wide range of projects, turning natural gas into more efficient and cleaner fuels, developing affordable technologies to unlock energy thousands of meters below the sea surface, R&D projects on low carbon technologies, and more.
Chaitanya Pradhan, a researcher for the Digital Rock and Image Analysis Group in Shell’s Computational Sciences Department, will give an overview of Shell, zoom into highlights of past internships, and make the case for spending 3 quality months in Bangalore this summer. Former Shell MISTI interns will also share their experiences.
Applications are currently being accepted for 2019 internships at Shell through MIT-India and MITEI. To learn more, visit: https://goo.gl/TESijF. Graduating students who may be interested in full-time positions at Shell are also encouraged to attend. Email mit-india@mit.edu for more information.
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The Digital Is Not Neutral: Thoughts on the Digitization of Threatened Cultural Heritage
Wednesday, December 5
5:30pm
Tufts, Granoff Music Center Room 155, 20 Talbot Ave, Medford
Erin Thompson, Associate Professor John Jay College (CUNY)
The recent targeting of cultural heritage during con ict, including the 2015 de- struction of Roman-era temples in Palmyra, Syria, by the Islamic State, has led to many new initiatives that seek to ght destruction with digital technologies. These projects recreate threatened or destroyed cultural artifacts or sites by developing 3D digital models. They thus apply new technology towards an old goal of creating 3D models of non-Western cultural heritage for Western audi- ences (including, e.g., plaster casts and stereoscopic photography). But digital collecting does not create neutral, truthful, exact reproductions of artifacts and sites. Digitization is not an automatic process; it requires the intervention of humans, and these interventions are based on our biases, assumptions, hopes, and hatreds. The talk will point out a number of problematic areas in digital collecting and will then compare these projects to alternative models of digi- tal collecting offered by contemporary artistic recreation projects. The talk will conclude by offering a few draft best principles for digital modeling of cultur- al heritage: transparency, radical hospitality, and the embrace of dissonance.
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Cannabis Technology, High Possibilities
Wednesday, December 5
5:30 pm – 8:00 pm
MIT, Sala de Puerto Rico (W20-202), Stratton Student Center, 2nd Floor, 84 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Cost: $5 -$45; Livestream $5 - $10
This event will be live streamed - select the live stream ticket option @ checkout if you would like to watch the event online.
If you registered for the live stream, you'll be emailed a link & password between 5:30PM & 6:00PM on the day of the event
A dialogue with industry experts about entrepreneurship in the cannabis industry
MITEF invites you back to continue the dialogue we started last year on the current and future state of Cannabis technology and your place in it. Once again we have brought together an exciting spectrum of cannabis cognoscenti from across business, community, academia, and technology to offer a range of views, insights, and opinions for how best to face the brave new world of legalized cannabis.
Our panelists will address:
What problems and opportunities exist in the Cannabis industry and how can we mobilize entrepreneurs to get involved in both?
What is the role of the innovation ecosystem in helping cannabis entrepreneurs? How are you a part of this ecosystem?
What have we learned about Cannabis in the recent past and fast coming future?
Are recreational and medicinal two separate things? Where are the connections and opportunities?
How can we use quantitative data to improve the qualitative experience?
How can technology help the cannabis industry grow without limitation?
What technologies and tools can be used to improve cultivation?
We look forward to your participation. There will be a discussion from the panel, followed by Q&A, followed by an opportunity to meet the local organizations pushing the threshold of technology at the 4th-floor bar!
Moderator
Vinit Nijhawan, Entrepreneur, Venture Capitalist, Academic
Panel
Simon Espinosa, CEO, En Volá Cannabis HUB / Quema
Mara Gordon, Founder, Zelda Therapeutics, Aunt Zelda’s, The Oil Plant
Jess Leber, Ph.D., Head of Business Development, Small Molecule APIs, Ginkgo Bioworks
Kevin McKernan, Chief Scientific Officer, Medicinal Genomics
Marion McNabb, Dr. PH, MPH, CEO and Co-Founder, Cannabis Community Care and Research Network
Event Schedule
Registration & Networking: 5:30 - 6:00 PM
Welcome and Panel Discussion: 6:00 - 8:00 PM
Beer, Wine & Networking: 8:00 - 9:00 PM
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UN Climate Negotiations: What has been achieved, where have we failed and what lessons can be drawn?
Wednesday, December 5
6 pm
Harvard Law School, Pound Hall Room 102
With Dr. Stefanos Mouzas. Professor Mouzas will share findings from his research on the multi-party, multi-issue negotiations involved in UN conferences on climate change, held between 2005 and 2017. His work builds on behavioural science to examine the dynamic process of responses to climate change. He will discuss key obstacles that hinder negotiations at the UN, and offer insights into why it is so challenging to achieve progress on a global agreement to reduce greenhouse gases.
More information at https://www.pon.harvard.edu/events/un-climate-negotiations-what-has-been-achieved-where-have-we-failed-and-what-lessons-can-be-drawn/
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Tackling The New Sharing Economy with Origin Protocol
Wednesday, December 5
6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
501 Boylston Street, Boston
Andrew Hyde, Head of Community at Origin Protocol, will join us and discuss how the new decentralized sharing economy works on Origin Protocol, and its' advantages over the tradition models. He will also discuss Dapp development, Identity and messaging.
Schedule
6:00pm - 6:33pm: Networking and Drinks
6:34pm - 7:16pm: Presentation
7:17pm - 8:00pm: QA / Hangout
What Is Origin Protocol?
Origin is building a platform that enables the creation of many decentralized marketplaces, allowing buyers and sellers to connect and transact directly on the blockchain. The company is building a set of protocols, developer libraries, and a decentralized application using the Ethereum blockchain and IPFS, with an initial focus on disrupting sharing economy marketplaces. Origin's mission is to reduce or remove transaction fees, promote open and transparent commerce, redistribute value more fairly to buyers and sellers, and empower the 2 billion currently unbanked individuals around the world to participate in digital marketplaces.
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Lest We Forget: A Doctor's Experience with Life and Death During the Ebola Outbreak
Wednesday, December 5
7:00 PM
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Harvard Book Store welcomes infectious disease specialist KWAN KEW LAI for a discussion of her new book, Lest We Forget: A Doctor’s Experience with Life and Death During the Ebola Outbreak. She will be joined in conversation by NAHID BHADELIA, an infectious disease physician and Boston University professor.
About Lest We Forget
In 2014 after fighting through yards of bureaucratic red tape, leaving her family, and putting her own health at risk in order to help suffering strangers, Kwan Kew Lai finally arrived in Africa to volunteer as an infectious disease specialist in the heart of the largest Ebola outbreak in history. What she found was not only blistering heat, inhospitable working conditions, and deadly, unrelenting illness, but hope, resilience, and incredible courage.
Lest We Forget chronicles the harrowing and inspiring time spent serving on the front lines of the ongoing Ebola outbreak—the complicated Personal Protective Equipment, the chlorine-scented air, the tropical heat, and the heartbreaking difficulties of treating patients she could not touch. Dr. Lai interweaves original diary entries to create a gripping narrative about life, death, and human relationships that will leave no reader unmoved.
Lest We Forget exposes the raw brutality of Ebola, as well as the chaotic nature of the undersupplied and understaffed health infrastructure in the developing world. At once a memoir of triumphs and failures and a memorial, this book will ensure that the victims of Ebola and the fighters who sought to heal them will not be forgotten.
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Mission 2022 Final Presentation
Wednesday, December 5
7:00pm to 10:00pm
MIT, Building 10-250, Huntington Hall, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Come see this year’s Terrascope students present their proposals for increasing water security on Navajo Nation to a panel of experts. Questions welcome from the audience as well as the panel.
Free and open to the public. Reception to follow.
Can’t make it?
Webcast link forthcoming!
OR watch our live stream on our Twitter (https://twitter.com/MITterrascope) or Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/events/2117644181819164/)
The class 12.000 Solving Complex Problems is part of Terrascope Mission 2022.
For more information, contact:
Elise Chambers (617-253-4074) - terrascope@mit.edu
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Thursday, December 6
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Design Thinking for Social Innovation Workshop
Thursday, December 6
8:30 AM – 11:00 AM EST
MIT, Stratton Student Center, 84 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/design-thinking-for-social-innovation-workshop-tickets-51884188003
Design Thinking is a human-centered, prototype-driven process that helps you frame the right problem and generate a broad range of creative solutions. It is practiced by a diverse set of businesses (e.g. Google, IBM, Fidelity Investments, Jet Blue, AirBnB) and social sector organizations (e.g. Cambridge Public Schools, Knight Foundation, Amnesty International). Join us for an interactive presentation to learn how to apply the tools, approaches, and mindsets of design thinking to tackle multi-stakeholder social sector challenges. You’ll leave with a basic understanding of how to conduct user interviews, generate ideas with groups, and rapidly make and test solutions.
SPONSORED BY:
Agassiz Baldwin Community, Cambridge Agenda for Children Out-of-School-Time, Cambridge Community Center, Cambridge Community Foundation, Cambridge Nonprofit Coalition, East End House, MIT, with special support from the Cambridge Agassiz Harvard Fund
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Urban Health: State of the Science
Thursday, December 6
8:30 a.m.–3:30 p.m. BREAKFAST (DOORS OPEN), 8 A.M.
BU, Hiebert Lounge, 72 East Concord Street, Boston
Services for Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing People Provided
#BUSPHSymposia
Livestreaming Available During Event
More than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas. By the year 2030, this will have increased to two-thirds. Urban living is an ubiquitous exposure for health. The day will bring together scholars from around the world to discuss the challenges and opportunities associated with creating health in urban contexts. Presenters will also discuss methods that can advance urban health scholarship and feature case studies from cities that have invested in population health, synthesizing the state of the science of urban health.
Cohosted with Boston University Initiative on Cities and Yale Institute for Global Health.
Agenda
8:00 a.m. – 8:30 a.m.
Breakfast and Informal Greetings
8:30 a.m. – 8:45 a.m.
OPENING REMARKS
Welcome
Sandro Galea, Dean and Robert A. Knox Professor, Boston University School of Public Health
David Vlahov, Associate Dean for Research and Professor, Yale School of Nursing and Professor of Epidemiology, Yale School of Public Health
PART ONE: HEALTH CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN CITIES
8:45 a.m. – 9:45 a.m.
CITY TRENDS
Inequities in Cities and in Urban Health
Patricia O’Campo, Vice President of Research, St. Michael’s Hospital and Professor, School of Public Health, University of Toronto Dalla Lana
Climate Change and the Health of Urban Populations
Patrick L. Kinney, Beverly Brown Professor of Urban Health, Boston University School of Public Health
Aging Populations
Kathleen Cagney, Professor of Sociology and Deputy Dean of the Social Sciences, University of Chicago
The Role of Health Departments in Creating Healthy Cities
Daniel Kass, Senior Vice President for Environmental Health, Vital Strategies, Inc.
Crime and Criminal Justice
Matt Vogel, Associate Professor, Criminology and Criminal Justice, University of Missouri–St. Louis and Researcher, OTB – Research for the Built Environment, TU Delft, the Netherlands
Moderated by: Kelly Henning, Public Health Program Lead, Bloomberg Philanthropies
9:45 a.m. – 10:40 a.m.
RESOURCES IN CITIES
Housing
Roshanak Mehdipanah, Assistant Professor, Health Behavior and Health Education,
School of Public Health, University of Michigan
Transportation
Mark Nieuwenhuijsen, Professor, Barcelona Institute for Global Health
Children and Adolescents in Cities
Shakira F. Suglia, Associate Professor, Epidemiology, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University
Economic Conditions
Atheendar Venkataramani, Assistant Professor, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
Improving Access to Health Foods in Cities
Monica Wang, Assistant Professor, Community Health Sciences, Boston University School of Public Health and Instructor, Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Moderated by: David Dudley, Editor, City Lab
10:45 a.m. – 11:00 a.m
Break
PART TWO: METHODS AND APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING HEALTH IN CITIES
11:00 a.m. – noon
THROUGH THE LENSES OF OTHER DISCIPLINES
History
Richard Rodger, Professor of Economic and Social History, University of Edinburgh
A Systems Science Approach to Urban Health
Danielle C. Ompad, Associate Professor, College of Global Public Health, New York University and Deputy Director, Rory Meyer College of Nursing’s Center for Drug Use and HIV Research, New York University
Health Services Research: Studying Healthcare Services in the City
Michael K. Gusmano, Interim Chair, Department of Health Policy and Behavioral Health Science and Associate Professor, Health Policy, School of Public Health, Rutgers University
Cells-to-Society Approaches
Guia Guffanti, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School and Director, Computational Genomics Lab, McLean Hospital
Moderated by: Nineequa Blanding, Director, Health and Wellness, The Boston Foundation
12:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m.
APPROACHES
Urban Design
Oliver Gruebner, Senior Researcher, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Community-Based Participatory Research: An Approach to Research in the Urban Context
Barbara A. Israel, Professor, Health Behavior and Health Education, School of Public Health, University of Michigan and Director, Detroit Community-Academic Urban Research Center and Angela G. Reyes, Founder and Executive Director, Detroit Hispanic Development Corporation
Multilevel Perspectives to Urban Health
Dustin T. Duncan, Associate Professor, Population Health, School of Medicine, New York University
Environmental Health Assessment
Carlos Dora, Former Coordinator, Public Health and the Environment Department, World Health Organization and Visiting Professor, Columbia University Medical Center.
Urban Planning: Leveraging the Urban Planning System to Shape Healthy Cities
Helen Pineo, Lecturer in Sustainable and Healthy Built Environments, Bartlett Faculty, Built Environment, University College London
Moderated by: Jalonne L. White-Newsome, Senior Program Officer, The Kresge Foundation
1:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m.
Lunch
PART THREE: CASE STUDIES IN URBAN HEALTH
1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
CityHealth: Policies for Today’s Urban Health Challenges
Brian C. Castrucci, Chief Executive Officer, de Beaumont Foundation
New York City: The Fit City Examples
Karen Lee, Associate Professor, Preventive Medicine, University of Alberta
Observatory for Urban Health in Belo Horizonte City: An Innovative and Cross-Sectoral Collaboration in Urban Health
Waleska Teixeira Caiaffa, Professor of Public Health and Epidemiology, Belo Horizonte Observatory for Urban Health, School of Medicine, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil
Rapid Urbanization in China
Brian J. Hall, Professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Macau
Boston: A Case Study
Russell P. Lopez, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Environmental Health, Boston University School of Public Health
Moderated by: Lola Adedokun, Director, Child Well-being Program and African Health Initiative, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation
PART FOUR: THE PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE OF CITIES
2:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.
Migration
Sabrina Hermosilla, Research Scientist, Global Mental Health Program, Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University
City Leadership for Health, Equity, and Sustainable Development
Agis D. Tsouros, International Advisor on Health Policy and Strategy, Global Healthy Cities and Former Director, World Health Organization
Healthy and Safe Spaces to Play and Work
Renée Boynton-Jarrett, Associate Professor, Pediatrics, Boston University School of Medicine
Regional Planning for Health
David Siscovick, Senior Research Scientist, The New York Academy of Medicine and Professor Emeritus, Medicine and Epidemiology, University of Washington
Moderated by: Katharine Lusk, Executive Director, Initiative on Cities, Boston University
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MIT China Forum: China's Universities in Perspective
Thursday, December 6
11:30am to 1:00pm
MIT, Building E52-164, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
Yingyi Qian, Professor of Economics, School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University. Distinguished Professor of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Tsinghua University
Professor Qian was born in Beijing and graduated from Tsinghua University in Mathematics. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University after earning an M.Phil. in Management Science/Operations Research from Yale University and an M.A. in Statistics from Columbia University.
He was on the economics faculties at Stanford University, the University of Maryland, and the University of California, Berkeley. He was the Dean of the School of Economics and Management at Tsinghua University in 2006-2018.
Professor Qian was elected as Fellow of the Econometric Society in 2012 and as inaugural Distinguished Professor of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at Tsinghua University in 2018. He was a recipient of the 2009 Sun Yefang Prize in Economic Sciences and the inaugural 2016 China Economics Prize. His main research areas include comparative economics, institutional economics, economics of transition and the Chinese economy.
He is the author of the book How Reform Worked in China: The Transition from Plan to Market (The MIT Press, 2017) and has published articles in international journals such as The American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, and The Review of Economic Studies.
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Walking Data and Talking Sculptures: Artistic Experiments in Environmental Education
Thursday, December 6
12:00-1:00pm
Tufts, Multi-purpose Room, Curtis Hall, 474 Boston Avenue, Medford
Catherine D’Ignazio, Assistant Professor of Civic Media and Data Visualization, Emerson College
In a world of pressing environmental issues, we don't just need civic engagement. We need civic imagination – the capacity to imagine alternatives to current social, political or economic conditions. In this talk, Dr. Catherine D’Ignazio will discuss two art and education projects that help posit these alternate futures in the environmental realm, as a way of mobilizing our capacity to collectively and joyfully dream of a more just society. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own creative environmental projects to share as well.
Catherine D’Ignazio (@kanarinka) is a scholar, artist/designer and software developer who focuses on data literacy, feminist technology and civic engagement. She has designed global news recommendation systems, run women’s health hackathons, created
talking and tweeting water quality sculptures, and led walking data visualizations to envision the future of sea level rise. Her art and design projects have won awards from the Tanne Foundation, Turbulence.org and the Knight Foundation and exhibited at the Venice Biennial and the ICA Boston. Her research at the intersection of technology, design & the social change has been published in the Journal of Peer Production, the Journal of Community Informatics, and the proceedings of Human Factors in Computing Systems (ACM SIGCHI). D’Ignazio is an Assistant Professor of Civic Media and Data Visualization at Emerson College, a Senior Fellow at the Engagement Lab and a research affiliate at the MIT Center for Civic Media & MIT Media Lab.
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Changing Security Dynamics in the Persian Gulf
WHEN Thursday, Dec. 6, 2018, 12:15 – 2 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, One Brattle Square (Room 350), Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR International Security Program
SPEAKER(S) Dina Esfandiary, Research Fellow, International Security Program
CONTACT INFO susan_lynch@harvard.edu
DETAILS Please join us. Coffee and tea provided. Everyone is welcome, but admittance will be on a first-come-first-served basis.
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xTalk with Prof. Emanuel "Ely” Sachs: Guided Discovery as a Teaching Method
Thursday, December 6
3:00pm to 4:00pm
MIT, Building 1-246, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
The term “Guided Discovery” refers to a teaching and learning environment where students are actively participating in discovering knowledge. The goal of discovery is to facilitate deep learning on the part of the students – learning that has its basis in fundamental understanding and often arises from viewing a problem from multiple perspectives. The pedagogical underpinning is that if the students discover the knowledge, they will, in the process, have created and added to their own scaffolded understanding. They will have formulated and evaluated hypotheses, rejected those that don’t seem to explain observations, confronted misconceptions, encountered surprises and finally come to an understanding that comports with experiment. By re-creating knowledge which already exists but is heretofore unknown to them, students will progress in learning how to create new knowledge, and they will have training in inductive reasoning – the method used to create most human knowledge.
This highly interactive presentation will showcase some of the guided discoveries used, in collaboration with my ME colleagues, in teaching 2.001. Data on student response will be presented.
Emanuel “Ely” Sachs is the Fred Fort Flowers and Daniel Fort Flowers Professor of Mechanical Engineering. He has been recognized for pioneering new approaches to teaching undergraduate education, focusing on active, hands-on participation by students in the discovery of knowledge.
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Health Benefit of On-Road Vehicular Emissions Control Program in China
Thursday, December 6
3:30PM TO 4:45PM
Harvard, Pierce Hall 100F, 29 Oxford Street, Cambridge
WANG Haikun, Associate Professor, School of Environment, Nanjing University; Visiting Scholar Alumnus and Collaborator, Harvard-China Project, will give a talk as part of the Harvard-China Project Seminar Series.
https://chinaproject.harvard.edu/event/health-benefit-road-vehicular-emissions-control-program-china
Contact Name: Tiffany Chan
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The Political Economy of Energy and the Potential for Conflict in the Middle East: From Iran to Gaza and Beyond
WHEN Thursday, Dec. 6, 2018, 4:30 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, CGIS South, Room S050, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR CMES/WCFIA Middle East Seminar
SPEAKER(S) Paul F. Saba, Esq., International Energy Attorney
CONTACT INFO elizabethflanagan@fas.harvard.edu
DETAILS Please note: this talk will take place in CGIS South, Room S050, 1730 Cambridge St.
Unless otherwise noted in the event description, CMES events are open to the public (no registration required), and off the record. Please note that events may be filmed and photographed by CMES for record-keeping and for use on the CMES website and publications.
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Ethics in a World of Strangers
WHEN Thursday, Dec. 6, 2018, 5 – 6 p.m.
WHERE 25 Shattuck Street, Boston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Education, Ethics, Health Sciences, Humanities, Law, Lecture, Religion, Science, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics
SPEAKER(S) K. Anthony Appiah, Professor of Philosophy and Law, New York University
COST Free, registration required
TICKET INFO http://bioethics.hms.harvard.edu/gay-lecture
CONTACT INFO HMS Center for Bioethics
DETAILS Hailed as a "postmodern Socrates," novelist, philosopher, and scholar, K. Anthony Appiah will deliver the 2018 Gay Lecture. One of the most powerful thinkers in the world, according to Forbes magazine, Appiah is known for his examination of the most compelling social issues of the day including morality, ethnicity, biologic race, religion, and identity. The Ethicist for The New York Times Magazine, Appiah addresses ethical questions weekly and is the author of numerous books including The Honor Code: How Moral Revolutions Happen, which received the Arthur Ross Book Award.
The George W. Gay Lecture is the oldest endowed lectureship at Harvard Medical School, and quite possibly the oldest medical ethics lectureship in the United States. The lectureship was established in 1917 by a $1,000 gift from Dr. George Washington Gay, an 1868 graduate of HMS. Gay gave Harvard the fund to provide an annual income to support lectures “to the advanced, or graduating classes in the Medical School upon Medical Ethics, and upon wise and proper methods of conducting the business of physicians, as relates to fees, collections, investments, etc.” The Gay Lectureship perpetuates his deep concern for the welfare of his patients and his appreciation of the constantly arising social and economic forces that impinge on medical care.
LINK bioethics.hms.harvard.edu
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Assessing the Relationship Between MIT and the Saudi Monarchy
Thursday, December 6
5:00pm to 7:00pm
MIT, Building 1-190, 33 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Please join us for this substantive forum that will explore ethical questions and potential conflicts of interest generated by the recent agreements between the Saudi monarchy and the MIT Administration.
The assassination of journalist Jamal Kashoggi and the military role of the Saudi Monarchy in Yemen call for a thorough examination of this relationship. The forum will include an authority on the Saudi monarchy, Helen Whiston of Human Rights Watch, and MIT faculty and graduate student panelists addressing questions of whether such relationships conform to MIT's mission and principles. A representative from the Administration has been invited to report on the Administration's examination of the relationships.
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Dolores film: Documentary on Dolores Huerta of the United Farmworkers Union
Thursday, December 6
5:00pm to 8:30pm
MIT, Building 4-370, 182 Memorial Drive (REAR), Cambridge
Film "Dolores" followed by a Q&A with Roxana Rivera from SEIU.
Pizza at 5pm
Film at 5:30pm
Sponsored by WGS + SA+P
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Groundwork and the Hanukkah Goblets at Winter Hill Brewing Co.
Thursday, December 6
5 PM – 9 PM
Winter Hill Brewing Company, 328 Broadway, Somerville
Groundwork Somerville and Winter Hill Brewing Company present Groundwork and the Hanukkah Goblets, our interpretation of the beloved children's story "Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins." But there's nothing to fear—the goblins will be replaced by goblets and defeated by the bright lights of our community coming together to support Groundwork's programs!
Join us on December 6th from 5 PM to 9 PM to raise your goblets—full of locally-brewed beer—and eat lovely latkes to benefit Groundwork Somerville! Known for putting the FUN in fundraising, Groundwork Somerville is collaborating with WHBC to celebrate Hanukkah and raise vital funds to support our many youth development, food access, environmental justice, and racial equity programs.
If you're not familiar with Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblin's story, you can watch a teaser of the acclaimed book at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0cQoMo0Enc and experience more of its magic at this event on the fifth night of Hanukkah.
Satisfy your inner goblin on December 6th with local beer ($1 from each sold donated directly to GWS), a full dinner menu including WHBC's take on latkes (potato pancakes), raffles for unique Groundwork and Somerville-based goodies and experiences, and a chance to hang out with the Groundwork staff and Green Team!
For more information, visit: bit.ly/groundworkgoblets
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Social Innovation Forum Annual Winter Reception
Thursday, December 6
5:30pm - 7:30pm
Microsoft New England R&D Center, Cambridge, MA
We invite our community of investors, supporters, and portfolio organizations to join us for the formal announcement of the 2019 Social Innovators and a celebration of the achievements of our portfolio organizations!
The evening will feature cocktails, hors d'oeuvres, and celebration.
We look forward to raising a glass to each of you - our incredible community of leaders, friends, volunteers and supporters
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Building a Better Internet
Thursday, December 6
6:00 PM – 7:00 PM EST
The MIT Press Bookstore, 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Join the MIT Press Bookstore in welcoming David D. Clark and Josephine Wolff to discuss their new books: David D. Clark’s Designing an Internet and Josephine Wolff's You'll See This Message When It Is Too Late.
David D. Clark & Josephine Wolff
David D. Clark is a Senior Research Scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab and a leader in the design of the Internet since the 1970s. In Designing an Internet, David Clark explains how the Internet is actually put together, what requirements it was designed to meet, and why different design decisions would create different internets.
Josephine Wolff is Assistant Professor in the Public Policy Department and Computer Security Department at Rochester Institute of Technology. She is a Faculty Associate at Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and a Fellow at the New America Cybersecurity Initiative. Her new book, You'll See This Message When It Is Too Late: The Legal and Economic Aftermath of Cybersecurity Breaches, examines a series of cybersecurity breaches from 2005 to 2015, the patterns that emerge from them, and what we can learn in their wake.
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The Hunt for Human Nature in Cold War America
WHEN Thursday, Dec. 6, 2018, 6 – 8 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture
SPEAKER(S) Erika Milam, Professor of History, Princeton University
COST Free and open to the public
DETAILS After World War II, evolutionary scientists began rethinking their views on humanity’s past. What if human history was not merely a cooperative struggle against a harsh environment? What if violence and war were normal states of existence, punctuated by brief moments of peace? These are the questions Erika Lorraine Milam explores in her new book, "Creatures of Cain: The Hunt for Human Nature in Cold War America." She will discuss how anthropologists and zoologists during the Cold-War era struggled to reconcile humanity’s triumph as a species with the possibility that this success might be rooted in our capacity to kill one other.
Lecture & Book Signing. Free and open to the public.
Presented by the Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments and Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology.
Free event parking available at 52 Oxford Street Garage
Link to Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/305953203500702/
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RPP Colloquium: Natural “SuperCooperation” and the Future of Our Human Family: Evolutionary Dynamics, Altruistic Virtues, and Spiritual Resources
Thursday, December 6
6 – 8:30pm
Harvard, Sperry Room, Andover Hall, 45 Francis Avenue, Cambridge
Evolution is an organizing principle of the living world. While competition is integral to evolution, cooperation can be seen as the master architect of biological complexity, language, and culture. Human beings have emerged from this evolutionary process as “SuperCooperators.” Nowak will discuss the scientific interpretation of evolution and its compatibility with Christian theology, which holds that God is the primary cause for all that exists, the creator and sustainer of the universe.
In conversation with members of the Sustainable Peace Initiative, Nowak will offer insights on how evolutionary dynamics, altruistic virtues of “SuperCooperation,” and spiritual resources can be leveraged to advance sustainable peace and on the potential role of universities.
Speaker
Martin Nowak, Professor of Mathematics and of Biology at Harvard University and director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics
Moderator and Discussant
Janet Gyatso, Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies and associate dean for faculty and academic affairs at Harvard Divinity School
Discussant
Anne Monius, Professor of South Asian Religions at Harvard Divinity School
Martin Nowak is Professor of Biology and of Mathematics at Harvard University and director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics. He works on the mathematical description of evolutionary processes, including the evolution of cooperation and human language, as well as the dynamics of virus infections and human cancer.
An Austrian by birth, Nowak studied biochemistry and mathematics at the University of Vienna with Peter Schuster and Karl Sigmund, receiving his PhD sub auspiciis praesidentis in 1989. He went on to the University of Oxford as an Erwin Schrödinger Scholar and worked there with Robert May, the later Lord May of Oxford, with whom he coauthored numerous articles and his first book, Virus Dynamics (2000). Nowak was a Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College and later at Keble College, and a Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow. He became head of the mathematical biology group at Oxford in 1995 and Professor of Mathematical Biology in 1997. A year later, he moved to Princeton to establish the first program in theoretical biology at the Institute for Advanced Study. He accepted his present position at Harvard University in 2003.
A corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Nowak is the author of over 400 papers and four books, and the recipient of numerous prizes, including the Weldon Memorial Prize of Oxford University, the David Starr Jordan Prize of Stanford University, and the Akira Okubo Prize.
Recommended Readings
Nowak, Martin A., and Roger Highfield. SuperCooperators: Altruism, Evolution, and Why We Need Each Other to Succeed. New York: Free Press, 2012.
Nowak, Martin A., and Sarah Coakley. Evolution, Games, and God: The Principle of Cooperation. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013.
With generous support from the Rev. Karen Vickers Budney, MDiv ’91, and Mr. Albert J. Budney, Jr., MBA ’74, as well as the Once Here Foundation.
This monthly public series, convened by HDS Dean David N. Hempton, brings together a cross-disciplinary RPP Working Group of faculty, experts, graduate students, and alumni from across Harvard University and the local area to explore topics and cases in religions and the practice of peace. A diverse array of scholars, leaders, and religious peacebuilders are invited to present and engage with the RPP Working Group and general audience. A light dinner is served and a brief reception follows the program.
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Addiction: Facing the Opioid Epidemic in Massachusetts
Thursday, December 6
6:30pm to 8:00pm
MIT Museum, 265 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Join us for an important discussion on the deadliest drug epidemic in U.S. history.
In partnership with WGBH, the Museum is proud to offer a free, special screening of NOVA’s new film, Addiction, followed by a panel discussion on the deadliest drug epidemic in US history and how technology can play a role in saving lives.
Panel:
Moderator: Julia Cort, Deputy Executive Producer, NOVA
Dr. Peter Chai, Department of Emergency Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Sara Holt, Producer, Director, and Writer of Addiction
Dr. Emily Lindemer (MIT Class of 2017), Cofounder of Hey, Charlie
This event is free but seating is limited. Pre-registration through Eventbrite highly recommended.
Doors open at 6:10 p.m. for Eventbrite ticket holders. Unclaimed reserved tickets will be released at 6:20 p.m. to walk-in attendees.
This event is presented in conjunction with The Beautiful Brain: The Drawings of Santiago Ramón y Cajal.
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Go Solar Melrose Launch Party!
Thursday, December 6
6:30 PM – 8:30 PM EST
Knights of Columbus, 23 West Foster Street, Melrose
Join us for the launch of the first city-wide solar campaign for small businesses and nonprofits! Hear from our elected officials, faith leaders, and local businesses about why they're helping to build a new local energy economy. Come and eat, drink and learn how you can be a part of this moment in fighting for our environment.
Free drink tickets for the first 25 people to RSVP
Visit the website, www.resonant.energy/go-solar-melrose for more information and to sign up for a no-cost evaluation.
The night will include:
6:30 - 7:15 Appetizers and drinks
7:15 - 7:45 Speakers
7:45 - 8:30 Networking
Meet some of the groups running the Go Solar Melrose campaign
Resonant Energy is a community-based solar provider. Our mission is to help underrepresented communities take their place at the forefront of the global transition to clean energy. We do this by financing and building high-quality solar arrays through local partnerships with nonprofits, houses of worship, affordable housing developments, small businesses, and homeowners across the income spectrum.
The Melrose Energy Commission is a group of Melrose citizens who volunteer their time and expertise to help the city, its residents, businesses and non-profits save energy. By reducing energy consumption, the commission is contributing tangible and positive steps toward lessening the harmful effects of global warming and climate change.
Boston Solar is the #1 residential solar contractor based in Massachusetts, with more than 3,600 installations in 7 years. We are proud to power Massachusetts, a state that continues to lead the nation in solar installations. We provide superior products, exceptional customer service, and the highest quality workmanship.
Boston Solar is dedicated to helping customers save money while improving the environment and supporting our local community. Every member of our team is focused on delivering the best experience for every customer.
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The State of AI
Thursday, December 6
6:30 – 8:30 pm EST
GA Boston, 125 Summer Street 13th Floor, Boston
Today, tech startups and corporate giants alike are experimenting with artificial intelligence. We know it’s coming, but where are we in the advent of AI and how soon will it weave into our daily lives—or has it already?
Overview: From applications in AI across industries to major ethical debates, the panel will discuss the state of artificial intelligence and how it’s evolved.
What You’ll Take Away: Attendees will learn about major trends in artificial intelligence and take away key use cases to look out for in the coming years.
Why It Matters: Your job--and all aspects of your life-- will be impacted greatly by artificial intelligence in the very near future. Learn how to harness the power of AI to make it work to your benefit.
About Our Partners
Boston New Technology
Boston New Technology is a tech and startup community whose mission is to help local startups succeed through free publicity, education, business connections, resources and live presentation opportunities at monthly events.
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Securing a World of Physically Capable Computers
Thursday, December 6
7:00 pm – 8:30 pm
MIT, Building 32-G449, 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
This talk will be webcast on the MIT CSAIL Youtube channel http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYs2iUgksAhgoidZwEAimmg/live beginning at 7pm.
Bruce Schneier
Computer security is no longer about data; it’s about life and property. This change makes an enormous difference, and will shake up our industry in many ways. First, data authentication and integrity will become more important than confidentiality. And second, our largely regulation-free Internet will become a thing of the past. Soon we will no longer have a choice between government regulation and no government regulation. Our choice is between smart government regulation and stupid government regulation. Given this future, it’s vital that we look back at what we’ve learned from past attempts to secure these systems, and forward at what technologies, laws, regulations, economic incentives, and social norms we need to secure them in the future.
Bruce Schneier is an internationally renowned security technologist, called a security guru by the Economist. He is the author of 14 books — including the best-seller Click Here to Kill Everybody — as well as hundreds of articles, essays, and academic papers. His influential newsletter Crypto-Gram and blog Schneier on Security are read by over 250,000 people. Schneier is a fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University; a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School; a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, AccessNow, and the Tor Project; and an advisory board member of EPIC and VerifiedVoting.org. He is also a special advisor to IBM Security and the Chief Technology Officer of IBM Resilient.
You can read more about him at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Schneier and follow his blog at https://www.schneier.com/.
This joint meeting of the Boston Chapter of the IEEE Computer Society and GBC/ACM will be held in MIT Room 32-G449 (the Kiva conference room on the 4th floor of the Stata Center, building 32 on MIT maps). You can see it on this map of the MIT campus.
Up-to-date information about this and other talks is available online at http://ewh.ieee.org/r1/boston/computer/. You can sign up to receive updated status information about this talk and informational emails about future talks at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/ieee-cs, our self-administered mailing list.
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Practical Online Virtual Reality in Higher Education
Thursday, December 6
7:00 PM – 10:30 PM EST
Brookline Interactive Group, 46 Tappan Street, 3rd floor, Brookline
Cost: $60
This workshop provides an introduction to the use of Multi-User Online Virtual Environments (MUVEs) in the classroom. The lecture will survey the basic uses of MUVEs to convey information and opportunities for project based learning with commonly available platforms. We will also take special care to compare the traditional interface (screen + mouse + keyboard) to the new VR headset interfaces (e.g. an Oculus Rift).
In the second half, attendees will virtually meet in MUVE using the HMD and computers available at Brookline Interactive Group. We will also experiment with content creation. The class is intended for teachers in colleges, high schools, and possibly middle schools.
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Friday, December 7
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Thesis Defense: Interaction Between Water Vapor, Radiation and Convection in the Tropics
Friday, December 7
11:00am to 12:00pm
MIT, Building 54-915, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
Tom Beucler
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Photochemical Processing of Biomass Burning Smoke: Influence on Optical and Chemical Properties of Particles
Friday, December 7
12:00PM
Harvard, 100F Pierce Hall, 29 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Professor Chris Cappa, UC Davis, will give a talk. Title TBA.
Atmospheric & Environmental Chemistry Seminar
Contact Name: Kelvin Bates
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Ash Community Speaker Series — Leadership, Organizing, and Innovation: Making Health Care Work
WHEN Friday, Dec. 7, 2018, 12 – 1 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Ash Center Foyer, Floor 2, Suite 200N, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge
Floor 2, Suite 200N
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Health Sciences, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, Harvard Kennedy School, and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
SPEAKER(S) Katherine Perera, Former Ash Center Democracy Fellow, Deputy Director in the English National Health Service, and a current Fellow of Practice in the Institute for Healthcare Improvement Psychology of Change program
Donald Berwick, MD, MPP, Institute for Healthcare Improvement President Emeritus and Senior Fellow
Moderated by:
Marshall Ganz, Senior Lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School
COST Free
CONTACT INFO info@ash.harvard.edu
DETAILS The Ash Community Speaker Series features discussions with students, faculty, fellows, and alumni whose research or other academic work is supported by the Ash Center. The series is a forum to discuss new ideas, innovative work, and ongoing projects that are related to the Ash Center's mission to make the world a better place by advancing excellence and innovation in governance and public policy through research, education, and public discussion.
Lunch will be served.
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LEED Platinum Urban Community Development
Friday, December 7
12pm – 6pm
Orient Heights, East Boston
RSVP at http://nesea.org/12-07-18
Cost: $25 -$35
Join NESEA for the final Pro Tour of 2018, the first stage of a planned 373 unit project in East Boston, designed and built for LEED Platinum certification.
This event will be hosted by ICON Architecture, and will showcase Orient Heights, a new construction of residential and community buildings ranging in height from two-to-five stories in a combination of townhouses and midrises. In addition to learning about the design and construction strategies, attendees of this tour will learn about the history of the site and the creation new open spaces and improve pedestrian and bicycle connections across the site.
Orient Heights will eventually include 42 units of affordable housing, a new community center and management office, a new public park, and significant connectivity improvements and enhancements that will improve circulation, safety, and access for vehicles, pedestrians, and cyclists.
The buildings are being constructed to a high level of energy performance – tight thermal envelope, triple glazed windows, heat recovery systems, and VRF systems in the townhouses and are expected to meet or exceed LEED Platinum standards.
Site Details
Units: Phase 1 includes 120 units of a planned 373 unit project
Square Footage: 105,000
Type of construction: New - still under construction
Mix of townhouse-style units and mid-rise style units
Project includes community center, management office, & public park
Units are being built with a tight thermal envelope, triple glazed windows, heat recovery systems, & VRF systems
Schedule
12:30 PM Doors open, registration, networking and coffee
1:00 PM Welcome by NESEA
1:10 PM Overview of the project by the host
2:00 PM Tour of project begins; attendees rotate through content-specific stations
3:45 PM Group Reconvenes back at initial meeting point
4:00 PM Reception with light refreshments
4:15 PM Q&A Panel with members of project team
5:00 PM Event Concludes
If you have questions about this event, you can contact Florence at fmacgregor@nesea.org or 413-774-6051 x10.
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BU Wind: A Student Forum on our Clean Energy Future
Friday, December 7
12:30 PM – 1:30 PM EST
BUild Lab, 730 Commonwealth Avenue, Brookline
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/bu-wind-a-student-forum-on-our-clean-energy-future-tickets-52140220804
Join us to talk about BU's Climate Action Plan, our recent Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) to build a new wind farm, and the role of students in creating significant and lasting change in BU's sustainability.
This event will include a short presentation on the PPA by Dennis Carlberg, breakout working groups, and lunch will be served!
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India on the U.S. Foreign Policy Agenda
Friday, December 7
2:00pm
MIT, Building E51-275, 70 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
Joint Seminar on South Asian Politics
South Asia's economic and strategic relevance has grown significantly and offers enormous intellectual and scholarly interest. The seminar, co-sponsored by MIT, Brown University, and Harvard University, explores the region with leading experts.
Speaker: Alyssa Ayres is senior fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). She came to CFR after serving as deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asia from 2010 to 2013. Her book about India’s rise on the world stage, Our Time Has Come: How India is Making Its Place in the World, was published by Oxford University Press in January 2018, and was recently selected by the Financial Times for its “Summer 2018: Politics” list. At CFR her work focuses on India’s role in the world and on U.S. relations with South Asia. In 2015, she served as the project director for the CFR-sponsored independent task force on U.S.-India relations, and from 2014 to 2016, as the project director for an initiative on the new geopolitics of China, India, and Pakistan supported by the MacArthur Foundation. During her tenure at the State Department in the Barack Obama administration, Ayres covered all issues across a dynamic region of 1.3 billion people (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka) and provided policy direction for four U.S. embassies and four consulates.
Joint Seminar on South Asian Politics is co-sponsored by the Brown-India Initiative at the Watson Institute at Brown University, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and South Asia Institute at Harvard University, and the MIT Center for International Studies
Free & open to the public | Refreshments served
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Nuclear Deterrence in an Age of Rapid Technological Change
Friday, December 7
2:00pm to 3:30pm
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Daryl Press, Associate Professor of Government, Dartmouth College
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Jennifer Light | Playing at City Building
Friday, December 7
5:00pm to 7:00pm
MIT, Building 7-429, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
A century ago, American children regularly played at city building in schools and youth serving institutions. Much of this activity took the form of “junior republics” – miniature cities, states, and nations run by kids. With supervising adults in the background, the young officials made laws, took civil service exams, paid taxes, ran restaurants, printed newspapers, and role played other civic activities. This talk, which draws on my forthcoming book States of Childhood, explores the historical and contemporary significance of these participatory simulations. I'll argue that the history of the republic movement helps to make visible children’s widespread contributions to American city building, and how their varied contributions were rendered invisible through an earlier era’s discourse about simulation and play. I'll also discuss the republic movement's resonances with a range of contemporary techniques and technologies from role playing and gamification to virtual worlds and augmented reality games, and suggest how recent work in the history of computing and information technology is making available new bodies of theoretical and empirical research for scholars and practitioners seeking a “usable past.”
Jennifer Light, Director of the Program in Science, Technology, and Society; Bern Dibner Professor of the History of Science and Technology; Professor of Urban Studies and Planning
Jen Light’s eclectic interests span the history of science and technology in America over the past 150 years. She is the author of three books as well as articles and essays covering topics from female programming pioneers, to early attempts to organize smart cities, to the racial implications of algorithmic thinking in federal housing policy, to the history of youth political media production, to the uptake of scientific and technical ideas and innovations across other fields. Professor Light is especially fascinated by smart peoples’ bad ideas: efforts by well-intentioned scientists and engineers to apply scientific methods and technological tools to solve social and political problems—and how the history of their failures can inform contemporary scientific and engineering practice.
Light holds degrees from Harvard University and the University of Cambridge. She has been a member of the Institute for Advanced Study and the Derek Brewer Visiting Fellow at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge. Her work has been supported by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and honored with the Catherine Bauer Wurster Prize from the Society for American City and Regional Planning History and an honorary doctorate from the Illinois Institute of Technology. Light serves on the editorial boards IEEE Annals of the History of Computing; Information and Culture; Historical Studies in the Natural Sciences; and Journal of Urban History. Professor Light was previously on the faculty of the School of Communication and the Departments of History and Sociology at Northwestern University.
MIT Department of Architecture
Fall 2018 Lecture Series
Design and Computation Lecture Series
Pasts, Presents, and Futures of Spatial Computing
Organized by Carlos Emilio Sandoval Olascoaga, PhD student
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Saturday, December 8
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MASSdestruction robot competition @Artisans Asylum Winter Marketplace
Saturday, December 8
8:00 AM to 8:00 PM
Artisan's Asylum, 10 Tyler Street, Somerville
Event:
IT'S TIME TO FIGHT THE ROBOTS!
MASSdestruction robot event on Saturday, December 8th, 2018.
Weightclasses include 1lb and 3lb for traditional Teleoperated combat.
NERC rules for 1lb and 3lb Robots
Mini Sumo competition rules will be based on these rules.
Competition format will be a modified swiss. Each robot will get a minimum of four matches. At the end of the matches, all robots will be ranked based on the performance during the day and the top four will compete in a single elimination tournament for the championship.
Registration fees are:
1lb, 3lb - $25
Mini Sumo - $5
Matches will take place in a 10x10 wooden floored arena.
Registration closes on 12/2.
Event Time:
December 8th from 8 AM until 8 PM.
CANCELLATIONS: Your event may be cancelled if too few people register. A decision will be made a few days before the event is scheduled to run, and you will be notified of the cancellation and your registration refunded in full.
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Playing For The Planet: World Music Against Climate Change
Saturday, December 8
7 PM – 10 PM
The Community Church of Boston, 565 Boylston Street, Boston
Cost: $15 - $20
The eighteenth “Playing For The Planet” benefit concert showcases master musicians from three different musical traditions in a rare and joyful pan-cultural evening, with all proceeds going to benefit the environmental advocacy group 350MA.org. Featured performers include Do Yeon Kim, the contemporary virtuoso of the Korean gayageum, Nepalese sarangi master Shyam Nepali, and New England’s great exponents of American folk tradition, Lorraine Lee & Bennett Hammond.
More information at http://www.warrensenders.com
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Sunday, December 9
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Humanism 2019: The Challenge of Eternal Vigilance
Sunday, December 9
1:00 PM to 3:00 PM
Phillips Brooks House, Harvard Yard, Cambridge
We'll hold our next lecture event (with snacks at 1) at the Phillips Brooks House again, on the Harvard University campus, Sunday December 9th at 1:30 pm. It is entitled, "Humanism 2019: The Challenge of Eternal Vigilance."
David Niose, legal director of the American Humanist Association's Appignani Humanist Legal Center and former president of both the AHA and the Secular Coalition for America, will discuss some of the major issues facing humanists and organized humanism in the the coming year and beyond.
With the 2018 election now behind us, Niose will discuss such questions as: What Church-State issues will be in the forefront in the coming year? Are there new possibilities for the Humanist movement in the changing American landscape? What about the Christian Right, anti-intellectualism, corporate power, and other obstacles to humanistic policy? Are the dynamics evolving--or not? Niose will discuss the activist issues that are likely to be front-and-center as we make our way through 2019 and head toward yet another election year in 2020.
We'll have time for a lively discussion after the talk.
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Monday, December 10
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Sunrise Movement Action Registration Form
Join us in Washington, DC on Dec. 10th to demand Congress make a real plan to address climate change.
Fill out this form to confirm your attendance!
Representative Ocasio-Cortez has proposed a Select Committee on a Green New Deal (https://ocasio2018.com/green-new-deal) in what is expected to be part of the resuscitated House Committee on Climate Change that existed from
The Plan for a Green New Deal (and the draft legislation) shall be developed in order to achieve the following goals, in each case in no longer than 10 years from the start of execution of the Plan:
100% of national power generation from renewable sources;
building a national, energy-efficient, “smart” grid;
upgrading every residential and industrial building for state-of-the-art energy efficiency, comfort and safety;
decarbonizing the manufacturing, agricultural and other industries;
decarbonizing, repairing and improving transportation and other infrastructure;
funding massive investment in the drawdown and capture of greenhouse gases;
making “green” technology, industry, expertise, products and services a major export of the United States, with the aim of becoming the undisputed international leader in helping other countries transition to completely carbon neutral economies and bringing about a global Green New Deal.
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Program on Misinformation
December 10
11:30 AM- 1:00 PM
Harvard, Adams House, 26 Plympton Street, Room TBA, Cambridge
Will Stevens, U.S. Department of State, Director of the Public Diplomacy Division, Foreign Service Institute
Bio. Will Stevens began work as the Director of the Foreign Service Institute’s Public Diplomacy (PD) Training Division in June 2017. Mr. Stevens is an experienced PD-coned Foreign Service Officer with overseas experience in Russia, Turkmenistan, Israel, and Belarus, as well as experience in Washington in the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs and the Bureau of African Affairs. He received the Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Public Diplomacy in 2014 for his work leading the U.S. Government’s Interagency Task Force on countering Russian propaganda during the Ukraine crisis. Mr. Stevens joined FSI from the Bureau of African Affairs, where he was a Senior Advisor on countering violent extremism. He previously worked in the Africa Bureau as Bureau Spokesperson, where he directed the public affairs planning and messaging for the 2014 U.S.-Africa Heads of State Summit, which brought together 50 African leaders in Washington for the first time. Mr. Stevens was the Spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Moscow from 2014-2016, where his team’s work was recognized in the Public Diplomacy Council’s annual “Ten Best” for the “Best Use of Social Media by an Embassy.” He has also served as Chief of Staff at the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, chief of public affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Turkmenistan, and in the press and cultural affairs offices at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv.
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Open Newsroom
Monday, December 10
5pm - 8pm
encuentro 5, 9 Hamiliton Place, Boston
Are you interested in doing serious journalism? Want to work with our team? Come join BINJ, MuckRock, and the Emerson Engagement Lab at this open newsroom to help us dig through public records related to police militarization and gun sales in MA.
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Civic XR: Using XR in the Public Interest
Monday, December 10
5:30 PM – 9:00 PM EST
Brookline Interactive Group, 46 Tappan Street, 3rd Floor, Brookline
Cost: $6
Join Boston VR & The Public VR Lab on Monday, December 10th from, 5:30-9:00 pm to demo and hear about ways civic-focused technologists are using VR/XR in the public interest space.
Pizza and soft drinks will be served.
CivicXR Presenters
Dave Maass, Senior Investigative Researcher at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), from San Francisco, CA who will present on how EFF is protecting our digital rights and demoing Spot the Surveillance, a virtual reality experience that teaches people how to identify the various spying technologies that police may deploy in communities. www.eff.org
Dave Maass is a senior investigative researcher for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, where he covers issues related to police surveillance, criminal justice, free speech, transparency, and government accountability. In addition to deep-dive investigations, Dave coordinates large-scale public records campaigns, advocates on state legislation, and masterminds special projects, such as a science fiction collection and EFF's first VR project, Spot the Surveillance. Prior to joining EFF, he worked as a reporter for alternative newsweeklies in every state along the U.S.-Mexico border. He is also one of RollingStone.com's correspondents for San Diego Comic-Con.
Kathy Bisbee, founder of the Public VR Lab, will present on how the Lab isbuilding a new field for Community XR, developing a global network of training programs, accessibility, and digital inclusion. The Lab's facility will host the Meetup, share how users can become members to use free and low-cost VR equipment, and will offer demos of the Lab's Hubweek-featured immersive installation, Arrival: Immigration in Full Frame, the first national virtual reality (VR) filmmaking project gathering and curating immigration/migration stories of Americans from pre-1620 through 2018 and incorporating them into a visual XR/VR timeline and a curriculum for facilitating community dialogue about immigration/migration at community hubs such as museums, libraries and arts centers across the country. www.publicvrlab.com
Other presenters include researchers Jennifer Gradecki and Derek Curryfrom Northeastern University who created the Crowdsourced Intelligence Agency project designed to engage the public around surveillance and national security issues; Jeff Jacobson from BostonVR and Boston Children's Hospital; a representative and demos from Planned Parenthood's VR team, and other interactive audio, 360, and VR/AR developers who are using XR for civic-minded projects and solving public interest problems.
BIG, the Public VR Lab, BostonVR and HTC VIVE are hosting a Dev Jam on the Saturday before the meetup and special advanced Unity classes. Sign up here!
Contact Erin at brooklineinteractive.org if you have a civic XR project you'd like to demo at the Meetup!
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ACT Fall 2018 Lecture Series: Untranslatable: Conceptual Art since the 90s
Monday, December 10
6:00pm to 7:30pm
MIT, Building E15-001, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge
David Joselit
ACT’s lecture series draws together artists, scholars, and other cultural practitioners from different disciplines to discuss artistic methodologies and forms of inquiry at the intersection of art, architecture, science, and technology. Each spring and fall semester brings a different thematic focus and the format for each event shifts depending on the visitor(s) and the nature of their presentations and performances.
ACT Fall 2018 Lecture Series: Vibrant Signs and Indeterminant Matter(s)
ACT’s Fall 2018 series is conceived by Judith Barry, ACT Director.
This series is made possible with the generous support of our partners and collaborators: The Council for the Arts at MIT (CAMIT)
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Are Humans Evolved to Run: Why (and how much) exercise is good for our health
Monday, December 10
6:30pm - 8pm
The Burren, 247 Elm Street, Somerville
More information at http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/science-by-the-pint/
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Questioning U.S.-Saudi Alliance: Yemen and the Politics of Famine
Monday, December 10
7:00 PM – 9:00 PM EST
BU, College of Communication, 640 Commonwealth Avenue, Room 209, Boston
In this panel discussion, we will be joined by experts on U.S.-Saudi relations, our questionable alliance, the terrible consequences the war has had on civilians in Yemen, our own impact by creating weapons and selling them to Saudi Arabia, and how we should stop this and other disastrous human rights abuses in the future.
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Tuesday, December 11
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The Biology of Complex Social Behavior
Tuesday, December 11
12:00pm
Harvard, BioLabs Building, Room 1080, 16 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge
Michael Platt, UPENN
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A Nice History of Bird Migration: Ethology, Expertise, and Conservation in 20th Century North America
Tuesday, December 11
5:15PM
Massachusetts Historical Society, 1154 Boylston Street, Boston
The Massachusetts Historical Society hosts "A Nice History of Bird Migration: Ethology, Expertise, and Conservation in 20th Century North America" with Kristoffer Whitney, Rochester Institute of Technology. Comment by Marilyn Ogilvie, University of Oklahoma.
Attendance is free, but you can subscribe online ($25) for the convenience of advance online access to the papers in FOUR series: this, our new Boston African American History Seminar, the Boston Area Early American History Seminar, and the Boston Seminar on Modern American Society and Culture.
Boston Seminar on Environmental History
Contact Name: Alex Buckley
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Mass Innovation Nights 117
Tuesday, December 11
6:00pm
WeWork - 200 Portland, 200 Portland Street, Boston
December's Mass Innovation Nights #117 will feature all sports and sports tech products! WeWork - 200 Portland is the host and sponsor for the night. You can expect a night of sports innovation with 9 products being showcased! Be sure to join us TUESDAY December 11th at 6pm.
Check out the new PRODUCTS and
VOTE for your favorites - click on the words VOTE HERE (found on this page to the immediate left) and once on the product voting page, click LOVE IT to vote for your favorite product!
RSVP to attend the event on TUESDAY, December 11th (free to attend and open to all)
See who else is planning on attending (click the ATTENDEES tab)
Help spread the word - blog, tweet (using the #MIN117 hashtag), like and post!
Support local innovation -- network and have fun at the same time!
Don't miss it -- Tuesday, December 11th 6pm-8:30pm for Mass Innovation Nights #117!
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Boston New Technology Cloud, Security and AI Startup Showcase #BNT96 (21+)
Tuesday, December 11
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM EST
Foley Hoag, LLP, 155 Seaport Boulevard, Boston
Cost: $0 – $79
21+. Join Boston New Technology at law firm Foley Hoag to:
See 7 innovative and exciting local Cloud, Security & AI technology demos, presented by startup founders
Network with 200 attendees from the Boston-area startup/tech community
Enjoy dinner with beer, wine and more
Each company presents an overview and demonstration of their product within 5 minutes and discusses questions with the audience.
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Upcoming Events
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Thursday, December 13
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MIT Center for Precision Cancer Medicine Inaugural Symposium: The Future of Precision Medicine
Thursday, December 13
8:00 AM – 6:00 PM EST
MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
Cost: $10 – $100
Over the past decade, there have been major advancements in the field of precision medicine, leading to exciting new treatments for some cancer patients. Much attention has been focused on genomic profiling of tumors to identify genomic alterations that might guide selection of specific therapies for individual patients. Beyond genomics, however, there is a variety of other precision approaches that can identify and exploit cancer-specific biological mechanisms including proteomics, metabolomics, and computational modeling, resulting in the more effective use of existing cancer medicines. On Thursday, December 13, 2018, the MIT Center for Precision Cancer Medicine will hold its inaugural annual symposium in the Samberg Conference Center at MIT. This full-day event will feature leading researchers and clinicians, who will highlight recent advances in precision cancer medicine and share perspectives on the future. An industry panel will also discuss the barriers to moving precision medicine forward into current and future clinical trials.
Speakers:
Andrea Califano, Columbia University
J. Christopher Love, MIT's Koch Institute
Richard Marais, CRUK Manchester Institute
Kenna Mills Shaw, MD Anderson Cancer Center
Charles Sawyers, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Alice Shaw, Massachusetts General Hospital
Matthew Vander Heiden, MIT's Koch Institute
Michael B. Yaffe, MIT's Koch Institute
Jean Zhao, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Panelists:
Peter Hammerman, Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research
Steffan Ho, Pfizer
Shiva Malek, Genentech, Inc
Kevin Marks, Agios Pharmaceuticals
S. Michael Rothenberg, Loxo Oncology, Inc
Moderated by Angela Koehler, MIT's Koch Institute
Breakfast and lunch are included with registration.
Registration or other questions? Please contact Leny Gocheva, gochevav@mit.edu
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How Utilities Can Drive Transformation Towards the Digital Utility: The Avangrid, Smarter Grid Solutions, and Simple Energy Case Studies
Thursday, December 13
12:30 PM – 1:30 PM EST
This webinar will discuss how Avangrid is embracing innovation and collaborating with startups to continuously adapt and implement impactful changes to drive decisions across its businesses and ultimately move towards the digital utility. During the discussion, we will learn more about the relationship with its venture arm located in Europe - Iberdrola Perseo Venture Capital Fund, how they are engaging with innovators located in the US, and their impact in the US market. Then we will examine two case studies to illustrate the different kinds of relationship Avangrid and Iberdrola can intiate with startups: Smarter Grid Solutions and Simple Energy.
Attendees will learn
The different ways an utility such as Avangrid and its venture arm can engage with early stage startups
The formats a strategic partnership can take
The importance of aligning strategies, customer value, sponsorship and patience
How a partnership can help leverage resources
Speakers
Drury Mackenzie, Smart Grids Innovation, Avangrid
Oscar Cantalejo, Investment Analyst, Iberdrola Perseo Venture Capital Fund
Zach Pollock, Business Development & Product Strategy Executive, Smarter Grid Solutions
Steve Mannhard, Director of Client Solutions, Simple Energy
Moderator: Kristin Barbato, Innovation Advisor, NYSERDA
Presenter: Alistair Pim, VP Innovation and Partnerships, NECEC
Agenda
12:30pm-12:35pm: Welcome
12:35pm-12:50pm: Speaker Presentations
12:50pm-1:10pm: Discussion
1:10pm-1:25pm: Audience Q&A
1:25pm-1:30pm: Wrap Up and Closing Remarks
NECEC's Investor and Corporate Partner Readiness Webinar Series aims to provide the cleantech innovation community with practical strategies to help strengthen the capacity of early-stage entrepreneurs, investors, corporations and incubators. The series will provide entrepreneurs with increased knowledge about investment models, sources and strategies, and the roles and expectations of large corporations and organizations. challenges in corporate partnerships, and how to successfully bring products to market.
Check out our playlist of all webinars in the series at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJrbjmAlXVxfuTfw_J90fjZdqFRd5SJAH
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Film Screening: Kumaré - The True Story of a False Prophet
Thursday, December 13
7:30pm to 9:30pm
MIT, Building 4-237, 182 Memorial Drive (Rear), Cambridge
To record this 2011 documentary, American filmmaker Vikram Gandhi transformed himself into Sri Kumaré, an enlightened guru from a fictional village in India, donning sagely robes, adopting a fake accent, and growing out his hair and beard. In the film, Kumaré travels to Arizona to spread his made-up philosophy and gain sincere followers. The film offers a fresh perspective on "belief in belief", cult psychology, and the ethics of deception towards ostensibly positive ends.
Please feel welcome to stay after the screening for an informal discussion of these issues.
Film running time: 84 minutes
Film website: http://kumaremovie.com/
Film trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBIIaTI8C5c
Free entry. Free concessions.
The event will be photographed and recorded.
Facebook event link: https://www.facebook.com/events/1916063458447347/
Event funded by the MIT ASA
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Friday, December 14
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NE Restructuring Roundtable: Forging Sustainable Solar (and Storage) Incentives for New England
Friday, December 14
9:00 am-12:30 pm
Foley Hoag LLP, 155 Seaport Boulevard, Boston
Solar installations in New England have risen dramatically, from under 100 MW in 2010, to nearly 3,000 MW this year (and growing rapidly). This growth has been largely due to falling solar prices and very supportive state-sponsored solar incentive programs and policies, such as net metering, solar renewable energy credits (SRECs), and community solar. Significant debate is taking place throughout New England (and nationally) about the sustainability of such solar incentives and policies.
The recent launch of the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target (SMART) Program is one attempt to create a more sustainable long-term solar incentive program, and the Green Bank in Connecticut is another. All states in New England are currently exploring ways to make solar incentives more sustainable, and to create the right incentives for storage, making this another timely and important Roundtable topic!
Please join us as we explore these and other questions:
How does the way we incentivize solar in New England need to evolve over time to become sustainable?
How should we structure incentives to balance tradeoffs between cheaper, larger scale solar projects on the one hand, and costlier, but potentially more valuable, distributed solar on the other?
How can state policies and rate designs be reformed to appropriately value solar resources and avoid inefficient expenditures or costs shifts between customers?
What can we learn from the solar experience as we consider how to jumpstart and incentivize the storage sector?
Forging Sustainable Solar (and Storage) Incentives for New England
Keynotes: Recent State Actions
Commissioner Judith Judson, MA Dept. of Energy Resources
Deputy Commissioner Mary Sotos, CT Dept. of Energy & Environmental Protection
Panel: Stakeholder and Academic Perspectives
Evan Dube, Senior Director of Policy, SunRun
Ilan Gutherz, Senior Director Strategy & Policy, Borrego Solar
Juliana Mandell, Dir. of Market Development & Policy, ENGIE Storage
Dr. Jesse Jenkins, Fellow, Harvard (Coauthor, MIT Utility of Future Study)
Mark LeBel, Attorney, Acadia Center
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State of the Humanitarian System
Friday, December 14
3 to 5pm
Tufts, ASEAN auditorium, iCabot Hall (on the mezzanine level above the “Hall of Flags”), 160 Packard Avenue, Medford
About every three years, the Action Learning Network for Accountability and Performance (ALNAP) issues a “State of the Humanitarian System” report, which is the closest thing we have to a global report card on how the humanitarian system as a whole is doing, how it is adapting to a rapidly changing context and set of demands, and where the major performance gaps are. The last report was in 2015. ALNAP will launch its 2018 report in December in London, Washington DC, New York, and Boston.
Please join us for the Boston launch on Friday, December 14, 2018 from 3 to 5pm at ASEAN auditorium at The Fletcher School at Tufts, in Cabot Hall (on the mezzanine level above the “Hall of Flags”), 160 Packard Avenue, Medford, MA.
The program will include a presentation of the report by ALNAP authors, responses to the report by members of the Boston humanitarian community (academic and practitioner), and Q & A. The event will be followed by a networking reception with light refreshments.
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Saturday, December 15
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Comics in Color - Volume 10
Saturday, December 15
2 PM – 4:30 PM
Grove Hall Branch of the Boston Public Library, 41 Geneva Avenue, Dorchester
Comics In Color is a safe space where you can come and just nerd out about illustrated stories by and about people of color.
Grove Hall Library Holiday Party!
Featured Guest: Michelle Abreu
Michelle Abreu is an Illustrator and comic book artist that loves to design characters and creatures. Michelle is currently working on two comic series, Novengard and TheLamb of the Altar, which can be found on AbreuIllustration.com.
Discussion: INTO THE SPIDERVERSE!
All-levels comics making activity
Samples of Black Comics
SNACKS!
If you would like to present a project you are working on just hit us up and we will get you on the agenda.
All are welcome but this is an event focused on comics by and about people of color.
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Sunday, December 16
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Protecting Boston's Waterways
Sunday, December 16
1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
Boston Nature Center, Mattapan
RSVP at https://www.massaudubon.org/get-outdoors/program-catalog#program:sanctuary=21:program_code=63572 call 617-983-8500 to register by phone.
Cost: $5 - $7
Nonmembers can join today during checkout and take immediate advantage of member prices.
Instructor: Adriana Cillo
Come and learn about the history of Boston’s municipal waterways and how to protect them and keep them clean. Join Adriana Cillo, Educational Programs Coordinator at Boston Water and Sewer Commission, as she discusses ways to reduce sewer backups by properly disposing of FOG (fats, oils, and grease). This talk will encompass a variety of details on our drinking water, wastewater, storm water and what we can do to help and prevent backups and clogging our pipes. Let’s protect our waterways! Small changes in our everyday life really can make a big difference for our environment.
Registration is required.
For more information, contact:
Boston Nature Center, 500 Walk Hill Street, Mattapan, MA 02126
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Opportunity
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Announcing Destination 2040: The next long-range transportation plan for the Boston region
How would you improve the Boston region’s transportation system? That’s the question at the heart of the MPO’s preparations for Destination 2040, which the MPO expects to adopt in the spring of 2019.
Every four years, the MPO identifies the system’s strengths and weaknesses; forecasts changes in population, employment, and land use; and creates a plan to address existing and future mobility needs. The resulting long-range transportation plan (LRTP) allocates funding for major projects in the Boston region and guides the MPO’s funding of capital investment programs and studies.
Use the new Destination 2040 website at http://ctps.org/lrtp-dev to explore the state of the system; learn how the MPO will identify needs, revisit its vision and goals, and prioritize its investments; and share your own interests, concerns, and ideas.
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Resource
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Where is the best yogurt on the planet made? Somerville, of course!
Join the Somerville Yogurt Making Cooperative and get a weekly quart of the most thick, creamy, rich and tart yogurt in the world. Members share the responsibility for making yogurt in our kitchen located just outside of Davis Sq. in FirstChurch. No previous yogurt making experience is necessary.
For more information checkout.
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Free solar electricity analysis for MA residents
Solar map of Cambridge, MA
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Sustainable Business Network Local Green Guide
SBN is excited to announce the soft launch of its new Local Green Guide, Massachusetts' premier Green Business Directory!
To view the directory please visit: http://www.localgreenguide.org
To find out how how your business can be listed on the website or for sponsorship opportunities please contact Adritha at adritha@sbnboston.org
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Boston Food System
"The Boston Food System [listserv] provides a forum to post announcements of events, employment opportunities, internships, programs, lectures, and other activities as well as related articles or other publications of a non-commercial nature covering the area's food system - food, nutrition, farming, education, etc. - that take place or focus on or around Greater Boston (broadly delineated)."
The Boston area is one of the most active nationwide in terms of food system activities - projects, services, and events connected to food, farming, nutrition - and often connected to education, public health, environment, arts, social services and other arenas. Hundreds of organizations and enterprises cover our area, but what is going on week-to-week is not always well publicized.
Hence, the new Boston Food System listserv, as the place to let everyone know about these activities. Specifically:
Use of the BFS list will begin soon, once we get a decent base of subscribers. Clarification of what is appropriate to announce and other posting guidelines will be provided as well.
It's easy to subscribe right now at https://elist.tufts.edu/wws/subscribe/bfs
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The Boston Network for International Development (BNID) maintains a website (BNID.org) that serves as a clearing-house for information on organizations, events, and jobs related to international development in the Boston area. BNID has played an important auxiliary role in fostering international development activities in the Boston area, as witnessed by the expanding content of the site and a significant growth in the number of users.
The website contains:
A calendar of Boston area events and volunteer opportunities related to International Development - http://www.bnid.org/events
A jobs board that includes both internships and full time positions related to International Development that is updated daily - http://www.bnid.org/jobs
A directory and descriptions of more than 250 Boston-area organizations - http://www.bnid.org/organizations
Also, please sign up for our weekly newsletter (we promise only one email per week) to get the most up-to-date information on new job and internship opportunities -www.bnid.org/sign-up
The website is completely free for students and our goal is to help connect students who are interested in international development with many of the worthwhile organizations in the area.
Please feel free to email our organization at info@bnid.org if you have any questions!
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Boston Maker Spaces - 41 (up from 27 in 2016) and counting: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=zGHnt9r2pQx8.kfw9evrHsKjA&hl=en
Solidarity Network Economy: https://ussolidarityeconomy.wordpress.com
Bostonsmart.com's Guide to Boston: http://www.bostonsmarts.com/BostonGuide/
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Links to events at over 50 colleges and universities at Hubevents: http://hubevents.blogspot.com
Thanks to
Fred Hapgood's Selected Lectures on Science and Engineering in the Boston Area: http://www.BostonScienceLectures.com
MIT Events: http://calendar.mit.edu
Harvard Events: http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/harvard-events/events-calendar/
Harvard Environment: http://environment.harvard.edu/events/calendar/
Sustainability at Harvard: http://green.harvard.edu/events
Meetup: http://www.meetup.com/
Eventbrite: http://www.eventbrite.com/
Startup and Entrepreneurial Events: http://www.greenhornconnect.com/events/
Cambridge Civic Journal: http://www.rwinters.com
Cambridge Happenings: http://cambridgehappenings.org
Cambridge Community Calendar: https://www.cctvcambridge.org/calendar
If you have an event you would like to see here, the submission deadline is 11 AM on Sundays, as Energy (and Other) Events is sent out Sunday afternoons.
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