Supercourse Newsletter, March 13
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http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/
March 13, 2006
You know the day destroys the night
Night divides the day
Tried to run
Tried to hide
Break on through to the other side
Break on through to the other side
-The Doors
Friends,
We have �broke on through to the other side�. We have hit a new
high. It is so impressive what our global team has done. We now
have 2,504 lectures in the Supercourse. Who could have believed
it? You all are wonderful in your interest in sharing your beau-
tiful lectures with the world. It is important to put this in
context. There are no collections of prevention lectures in the
CDC, NIH, London School of Hygiene that approaches this. If we
assume that one lecture is about the same as a book chapter, and
there are 10-15 book chapters in a book, then we have collected
200-250 books on public health. There are few libraries in the
world that have 250 books on public health. If each lecture took
40 to create and practice, that would be 10,000 hours, or an
amazing 5 years to create, yet we all have shared our efforts
and given this gift to each other for free. I am very proud of
you, I am very proud of us.
A friend of mine, Steve Puluka made a wonderful observation. I
was telling him that we were planning to build a Supercourse of
Science, where we develop a Supercourse not only for prevention,
but also for all science. He said, �isn�t it wonderful that pub-
lic health science is doing this first�. You know what, it
really is, as with our global networking and sharing we are
really demonstrating what can be done for all of science.
Also, I was at the State Department last week and a person was
impressed of the �global diplomacy� of the project where people
of all religions and countries are working together. 2,500 lec-
tures could not have been achieved without the help of Muslims,
Hindis, Christians, Buddhists, Jews those with no religion. Or
shoes in China, Russia, Argentina, Cambodia, Canada, Mali, etc.
Andrei Troufan, a great friend of mine framed it by indicating
that we are all very different people but in the Supercourse we
are on the same plane, and that is the plain to improve global
health, in many ways when in this plane, all other characteris-
tics of ours are irrelevant.
What has been striking also is that we send the newsletter to
over 31,000 people a year. Less than 0.5% come off each time. We
are a team.
I feel very pleased as to what we have accomplished, we are
transforming prevention. We are changing higher education, and
we are friends.
Thank you some much for what the Supercourse group has accom-
plished. I am very proud of us.
This does not mean, however, that we are done... keep sending in
your lectures, pester your friends... Two years ago 2,500 lec-
tures was an absurd dream, it had never been done, and could
never be done... but it is done... This is the year of the dog,
Benson, my dog really happy that we did this. We could have
5,000 lectures in 2010... the year of the tiger!! Let�s go for
it.
�Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people
can change the world. Indeed. It is the only thing that ever
has.� -- Margaret Mead
�He who wished to secure the good of others, has already secured
his own.� �- Confucius
Onward to the next 2,500. The Supercourse is doing something
never accomplished before. Thanks so much.
Lecture of the week:
The topic of Avian flu epidemic has been highlighted by many re-
search articles in the past several months. Supercourse is
catching up with the new lecture from Dr. Thoa on avian flue
epidemic in Vietnam. The lecture can be accessed via
http://www.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec22581/index.htm
It gives a wonderful description of the epidemiology of avian
flu in Vietnam, characteristics of outbreaks, graphics, and com-
munity mobilization efforts. This lecture is very useful for any
scientist with the interest in this epidemic...
--
Ron, Faina, Mita, Soni, Eugene, Francois, Raina, Arlene, Rashid,
Saida, Ezzelden, Julia
mailto:super1+@pitt.edu