Global Trends

Thursday, July 31, 2014, 10am to 11:30 in the Meeting Room (behind the fireplace)

For the final meeting in July, under the theme of International Affairs, we will Zoom-Out to look at overall global trends. No one is better able to do this than Hans Rosling who uses UN data in dynamic and entertaining ways to show how the world has progressed beyond our preconceived notions. Rosling has given many TED Talks, we will look at the first two.

• The best stats you've ever seen - Rosling demonstrates how data tells how most of the world has caught up with the west
• New insights on poverty - Rosling shows why there is still hope for the parts of the world that is still in poverty

Zoom-In on Immigration

Thursday, July 24, 2014, 10am to 11:30 in the Meeting Room (behind the fireplace)

The group had a lot to say about immigration, though somewhat disorganized. While that was normal, there was a sense of frustration because we hopped for issue to issue. Nevertheless, the group wanted to spend another week on the immigration topic.

Please leave a comment on the blog on what immigration issue you want to discuss. We will discuss the issues in the order that they are submitted.

Immigration

Thursday, July 17, 2014, 10am to 11:30 in the Meeting Room (behind the fireplace)

For the third session in International Affairs, we will discuss the broad topic of Immigration. To get the conversation started, here is a TED Talk by Jose Vargas, about the plight of Americans w/o Papers, aka Illegal Aliens. After that we can talk about any immigration issue of interest.

There are many topics we could cover, so if you have an immigration issue that you want to discuss, please leave a comment to reserve your spot.

Afghanistan

Thursday, July 10, 2014, 10am to 11:30 in the Meeting Room (behind the fireplace)

We will continue with the International Affairs theme by zooming-in on Afghanistan. Skye, who was deployed there, has prepared a presentation and will lead the follow-up discussion.

Please help our group by preparing before coming to the meeting. General background information for Afghanistan can be found HERE in Wikipedia. Any other information or questions related to Afghanistan is welcome.