Students worldwide can earn Yale credits via summer online courses

Once again this summer, students around the world can take Yale College courses for credit on a range of topics without ever stepping foot in New Haven, via the Yale Summer Session online courses program.

The summer online courses were offered for the first time last year. The program was so successful that the number of courses being offered this year has grown from two to nine

The courses are all taught by Yale faculty. Innovative virtual classroom technology is used to link the students with the professors and their classmates for live seminars and discussion sessions. Click here for a video demonstration of how the courses work.

The courses are open to qualified applicants who are currently either in college or university or beyond, and students must apply for admission as they would for any in-resident Yale Summer Session course.

The five-week courses will be offered in two sessions over the summer; each course is worth one Yale College credit (the equivalent of four credit hours), and tuition is the same as summer resident courses.

The Session A courses will be held June 4-July 6; the application deadline is May 14. The offerings and instructors are:

• “Milton,” John Rogers. A study of Milton’s major poetry, with attention to his relation to the cultural, social, and political struggles of the Puritan Revolution. 

• “Jazz and Race in America,” Thomas Duffy. A study of the evolution of jazz, from its precursors in the music of Africa through its beginnings in New Orleans to its fusion with rock in the 1970s .

• “Introduction to Psychology,” Kristina Olson. A survey of major psychological approaches to the biological, cognitive, social, and emotional bases of behavior.

• “Sex, Evolution, and Human Nature,” Laurie Santos. An exploration of how natural selection works and how it can be applied to the study of human psychology. Click here for a video of Laurie Santos discussing her course.

Session B will run July 9-Aug. 10; the application deadline is June 18. The courses and instructors are:

• “Welfare Economics of Public Policy,” Donald Brown. A study of the microeconomic models used to design and evaluate the efficiency and equity of public policies.

• “Introduction to Green Energy,”Yehia Khalil. A look at the role of green energy — such as solar thermal, solar photovoltaic, wind, biofuel, hydro, geothermal, and nuclear power; ocean thermal energy conversion; and harvesting of tidal power — in mitigating the impact of greenhouse gases and global warming.

• “Listening to Music,” 
Craig Wright. An introduction to the ways in which music is put together and how to listen to a wide variety of musical styles, from Bach and Mozart, to Gregorian chant, to the blues.

• “Moralities of Everyday Life,” Paul Bloom. A study of the modern science of moral thought and moral action through disciplines such as cognitive science, social and developmental psychology, neuroscience, behavioral economics, and analytic philosophy. Click here for a video of Paul Bloom discussing his course.

• “Introduction to Middle East Politics,” Ellen Lust. An overview of politics in the Middle East and North Africa. State formation, the roles of religion and oil in politics, political institutions, economic development, and the prospects for economic and political reform.

For application information, click here.

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