[afro-nets] Supercourse Newsletter, December 24, 2003

[Ron Laporte <super1+@pitt.edu>]

Supercourse Newsletter, December 24, 2003
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Ho Ho Ho...
 
It is the night before Christmas, and all through the house, not 
a creature was stirring, not even a Supercourse member.
 
It has been a beautiful year, and we wish you were all over at 
our house for Christmas. Jan is cooking a roast beef, and her 
parents are coming to celebrate. Our dog Benson is going nuts as 
the beef is cooking and we have had 10 deer walking around. This 
morning we had an inch of snow, very beautiful, very peaceful.
 
This has made us to think about what we are developing. As a 
good friend, Shai Linn has said, the Supercourse isn?t about 
health... it is about peace and health. We get along a lot better 
than the United Nations. It is wonderful have friends in Egypt, 
Uganda, Australia, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Buffalo, NY... true 
friends.
 
Where are we going?
 
The speed of the Supercourse is astounding. Next week we will go 
over what we did last year. It is amazing. What we need from you 
are ideas as to where we can go.
 
We also need your help, we are at 1599 lectures... please... please
please... think about sending one in so we can jump over the 1,600 
barrier before 2004. We really need to have both the number of 
lectures and the year devisable by four.
 
Social Entrepreneurs: This is a wonderful concept that people in 
business are starting to talk about. We are in fact "health En-
trepreneurs". The NYTimes had a great article about this at: 
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/20/arts/20SOCI.html
 
"We need innovative solutions to social problems, and increas-
ingly societies are realizing that private citizens, acting in 
entrepreneurial ways, blending business tools with relevant so-
cial expertise, are the best hope for finding those solutions," 
said J. Gregory Dees, director of the Center for the Advancement 
of Social Entrepreneurship at the Fuqua School of Business at 
Duke University and a leading expert in the budding field. 
"These citizens are social entrepreneurs."
 
The Supercourse faculty is in fact taking a very entrepreneurial 
approach to improving the translation of research into the 
classroom, and improving our teaching. We are thinking of writ-
ing a paper discussing the idea of the Supercourse and Health 
Entrepreneurship. We would love to have your opinion about this.
 
When one is a kid at Christmas, there is a sense of "family". I 
have the sense of "family" with you all in the Supercourse.
 
We wish you all a "Merry Christmas" not in the religious form, 
but in the friendship, warmth, collegial and peaceful form. 
 
Best regards...
 
Please, if you buy us a present do not pay more than $1,000. 
(only kidding)? but a wonderful lecture of yours for a present 
would be a gift to us, and a gift to the world!
 
Happy Holidays.
 
Ron, Faina, Mita, Eugene, Akira, Tomoko, Wendy, Julia, Rania, 
Abed, Arin, Denish, Charles, Akram, Soni, Soek Won
mailto:super1+@pitt.edu