Mini-College Sessions
Family Weekend offers mini-college faculty lectures, which are a popular tradition! You can select one of the following lectures to attend without specifically indicating your preference on the registration form.
All Mini Colleges are scheduled to take place on Saturday, November 8, at 10 a.m in Thwing Center.
Please select from one of the following:
Biology in the News
Meeting Location: 1914 Lounge, Thwing Center
Nancy DiIulio, Instructor of Biology
This discussion will center on the latest newsworthy discoveries in biology. Participants will learn about the latest research being covered by the popular press, and how those topics are integrated into the Case biology curriculum. News articles will be chosen during the weeks just prior to the session, so it is too soon to predict what will be discussed!
The Birth of Photography and the Rise of the American Landscape
Meeting Location: Spartan Room, Thwing Center
Dr. Anne Helmreich, Associate Professor of Art History
This talk will explain how photography was first invented and explore the most important photographic subjects — the western American landscape from nineteenth-century photographers such as Carleton Watkins to twentieth-century photographer Ansel Adams.
The Chemistry, Physics, and Engineering of Plastic Beer Bottles
Meeting Location: Ballroom, Thwing Center
Dr. David Schiraldi, Associate Professor of Macromolecular Science and Engineering
In the 1970s, glass soda bottles gave way to plastic ones; the same process has begun for beer bottles. The demands for packaging beer are greater than for water or soda. We will discuss how chemistry, physics, and engineering come together in what looks like a simple object.
Comics and Critical Thinking
Meeting Location: Meeting Room A, Thwing Center
Dr. Brad Ricca, Fulltime Lecturer of English
How do we read comics? From Snoopy to Spiderman, we tend to read comics as left-to-right narratives. But are they more than that? Looking at some comics, we will use our own very important powers of critical thinking to ask: What do we see here? What can we know? And we'll talk about Superman, too.