Current Class
Schedule & Registration
Here are the schedule and descriptions of current classes, workshops, and conversations at Let’s Learn! this semester. Each description includes a registration link.
Hope to see you in class!
Special Offerings!
FALL 2026
For Profit Higher Ed: The Promise and the Trap
Leah Barlow, Ph.D.
Saturday, September 5, 2:00 pm- 3:30 pm (Time Zone Converter)
The promise of American education for over 150 years has been the promise of upward mobility, a golden path out of poverty toward a better material life and widening cultural horizons—that is, if you’re smart enough and work hard enough.
Is this true or is American education a false meritocracy? For communities of color, and for poor people in general, the road to higher education has been full of potholes, landmines, roadblocks and checkpoints. In recent decades, for-profit colleges and universities have lured in millions of students leaving them with little to show for their hard work and tuition money other than a lifetime of debt.
In this class, Dr. Leah Barlow, professor of African American Studies at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, will explore the realities of for-profit education, its promise, its traps and its implications for the future of education in the U.S.A.
Poetry in a Time of Trouble and Crisis
Caroline Donnola
Saturday, September 19, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Poetry can do many things. It can help us appreciate the beauty in the world; give voice to love and joy; make it possible to connect with others in deeper ways. Poetry-making can also be a way of engaging trouble and crisis—whether personal, political, or philosophical. In this workshop, we’ll explore poetry’s capacity to address our most formidable challenges. Last November, during one of her Poetry Salons, Caroline suffered a serious stroke. It took her half a year to—literally—get back on her feet and begin recreating her life. Out of that came her new book, Songs in a Time of Crisis—The Poetry of Stroke. Join her in exploring how poetry can help open new doors in some of the most daunting and difficult circumstances. No previous poetry writing experience is required—just pen and paper and a willingness to explore.
Caroline Donnola hosts the bi-monthly “Poetry Lovers Virtual Salon” for poets and poetry lovers of all levels of experience (including no experience). She has taught writing classes for decades in colleges, high schools, and continuing education programs. She currently teaches “Poetry for Everyone,” a 4-week nontraditional poetry writing class on Zoom.
Indoor Gardening
Emilie Knoerzer
Saturday, September 26, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Eastern U.S. time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Not everyone has a chance to sink their hands into the soil, plant seeds and nurture fruits, vegetables or flowers to glorious maturity. We may want a garden, but so many of us live in apartments far from the soil and with limited sunlight. We may be living in a part of the world covered by asphalt and cement. That doesn’t mean we can’t garden. Veteran gardener and community organizer Emilie Knoerzer shows us how, no matter how small or dark our living space, we can bring some green into our lives.
International Short Story Reading Club
Sowjana Siva
Sundays, September 27, October 4, 11
2:00 pm – 4:00 pm Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here> Sunday, September 27
Register Here> Sunday, October 4
Register Here> Sunday, October 11
This three-week offering is a unique gathering of people from all over the world (including you, if you choose) who will read aloud, and discuss as they go along, short stories from distinct cultural traditions around the globe. The Short Story Reading Club is led by a senior director at the Intercontinental Exchange and a well-read polymath—Sowjana Siva. The stories will be in English translation and will be read out loud from the screen. Each session lasts two hours. No previous exposure to international literature is required.
“High Diddle Diddle, the Cat and the Fiddle, The Cow Jumped Over the Moon”
Nick Gross, Ph.D., and Jim Martinez, Ph.D.
Saturday, October 3, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
In April the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) successfully completed Artemis II, the first crewed flyby of the Moon in 50 years. Why did we wait half a century to “jump over the moon” again? What did we learn from this trip? Why does it matter and to who?
Join two scientist-activists—physicist Dr. Nick Gross of the NASA Shield Drive Center at Boston University, and Dr. Jim Martinez, Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at New York Institute of Technology—as they discuss with each other, and with you, what Artemis II means to them, to you and to the world.
Black Women of the Abolitionist Movement
Dr. Lee Blake, President of the New Bedford Historical Society
Saturday, October 10, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Although ignored in most official histories, Black women were among the most important drivers and leaders of the Abolitionist Movement in the 19th Century. From famous leaders like Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman to lesser-known leaders such as Elizabeth Piper Ensley and Jane Adora Major Jackson, they lectured extensively, organized petition campaigns and boycotts, and were foundational to functioning of the Underground Railroad. (Image: Sojourner Truth, Harriett Tubman, and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper)
Lee Blake, president of the New Bedford Historical Society, who has received six “National Endowment for the Humanities awards for “Landmarks of American History” and is currently writing a book about the role of the Black women in the anti-slavery movement in New England, will lift the veil on these forgotten women and their important contributions to the abolition of slavery.
Diego Rivera’s Murals: The Beauty and the Power
Sue Davies
Saturday, October 17, 2:00 pm-3:30 pm Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Mexican muralist Diego Rivera was a giant of 20th Century art. He completed scores of powerful public murals depicting historical and political themes from Mexico City to Detroit—in the process launching the Mexican and international mural movement, which continues to inspire street artists round the world today. His radically progressive politics, reflected in his paintings, often got him in trouble with those in authority. Join Sue Davies, long-time progressive activist who has traveled the world viewing and photographing street art, in this introduction to the life and work of Diego Rivera.
Beronda Montgomery, Ph.D., with Omar H. Ali, Ph.D.
Tuesday, October 27, 9:30 am -10:30 am Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Award-winning plant biologist Beronda L. Montgomery and author of Lessons from Plants (Harvard University Press, 2021) explores in her latest book When Trees Testifythe ways seven kinds of trees are intertwined with African American history and culture. As Dr. Montgomery details, pecan trees were domesticated by an enslaved African named Antoine, sycamore trees were both havens and signposts for people trying to escape enslavement, and willow bark offered the gift of medicine. Combining science and history with stories from her own life, Dr. Montgomery will have a conversation with historian Omar H. Ali for all to join.
When Trees Testify
Climate Refugees
Amali Tower
Saturday, November 7, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm, Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Everyday thousands of people are forcibly displaced due to impacts generated by global warming. This isn’t something that will happen, this is something happening now.
Climate Refugees, an independent, non-profit was founded in 2015 to call attention to and advocate for people around the globe who are losing their homes and livelihoods due to draught, fire, rising sea level and famine as our planet rapidly heats up. The Founder and Executive Director of Climate Refugees, Amali Tower—a member of the World Economic Forum Expert Network in Migration, Human Rights & Humanitarian Response, and the University of California Berkeley climate refugees working group—willdiscuss the human impact of global warming and what is being done to help. There will be plenty of time for questions and discussion.
Africans in the Ancient Mediterranean World: Science and Medicine
Omar H. Ali, Ph.D. and Rebecca Muich, Ph.D.
Tuesday, November 17, 9:30 am-10:30 am Eastern U.S. Time (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
Drawing from their new book Africans in the Ancient Mediterranean World (Hackett Publishing, 2026), historian Omar Ali and classics scholar Rebecca Muich will share aspects of science and medicine in antiquity to reveal extraordinary creativity, patience, and experimentation in the ancient world. Starting with an overview of what may be characterized as an Afro-Greco-Roman world, they will highlight specific innovations and practices for which there are historical and archeological evidence. Come join this presentation and discussion and learn about African scientists in shaping world history.
Colonization, ‘Thanksgiving’ and the Wampanoag Story
Linda Coombs
Saturday, November 21, 2:00 pm - 3:30 pm (Time Zone Converter)
Register Here
When the Pilgrims came to what they later named New England they didn’t arrive at a vast, empty land ready to be developed. They disembarked to find communities of people living in harmony with the land they had inhabited for thousands of years. They brought with them disease, wars of conquest and genocide. It is history of deep injustice and of historic rebellion and determination to survive by native peoples.
This class will be led by Linda Coombs, an historian from the Wampanoag Tribe of Aquinnah, the people who first encountered the European settlers in 1620. She lives in the Wampanoag community of Mashpee on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Coombs is the author of Colonization and the Wampanoag Story and has worked for decades at the Wampanoag Indigenous Program of Plimoth Plantation. Please join her and learn the real story of the first “Thanksgiving” and the devastating impacts that followed. There will be plenty of time for questions and conversation.