Cascade! Winter 2013
Course Catalog

Infinity is really big. But we can think about infinity - and we can even see it. In this class, we will draw infinitely-detailed pictures known as fractals, in which you get a smaller version of the original picture by zooming in. Next, we will investigate some cool patterns of numbers that show up in our fractal pictures and in nature. Later, we will suppose we have two piles of infinitely many rocks. Can we determine which pile has more rocks? We can, and we will figure out how! Come join us for a look at how math can be creative, bizarre, and thought-provoking. No experience is required!

What do glow-in-the-dark rabbits and drought-resistant corn have in common? Both are the products of human technology, created by altering the genetic material of these organisms. Synthetic biology is the study of how to control the natural mechanisms that determine the characteristics of living things. The potential of synthetic biology is truly thrilling, and it enables us to come up with new perspectives on how to make biological research more efficient and useful to society.

Presented by rotating teachers, our class will cover the foundations of synthetic biology. We will also try an experiment ourselves, explore the ethical and moral questions scientists and policy makers face, and present our own ideas about how technology can transform the world of biology in the future.

You might assume that our senses provide us with a perfect representation of reality. But can we actually trust our senses? Our prior knowledge of the world, interactions with our surroundings, and personal feelings all play an important role in how we perceive things. This course will examine visual perception and show how it is a unique and accessible window into how our complex brain works. During the first week of the course, we will provide a general introduction to major structures and functions of the visual system. During weeks 2-5, we will focus on visual illusions of depth, color, motion, time, and face perception to illustrate how our visual system incorrectly represents the sensory information that it receives.

Leadership is everywhere, from the Founder of Facebook to the President of the United States to your neighbor's six-year-old daughter selling lemonade from a stand on the corner. Interestingly, the skills used for each of these roles are very similar, and being a "leader" does not always require the type of effort necessary to run a country. In this class, we'll explore those skills and apply them by creating fun and easy entrepreneurial projects that you can carry out in your own schools and communities.

Sometimes, Disney makes mistakes. So does Warner Brothers, and Dreamworks, and countless other movie production companies. We hate to break it to you, but Pocahontas and John Smith were not lovers, more than 300 Spartans fought the Persians in the Battle of Thermopylae, and John Nash never actually saw anything during his hallucinations. So why does Hollywood include inaccuracies like this when making movies? If you are a movie lover, a history buff, or deep thinker of any kind, join us in answering this question as we examine the types, motives, and consequences of historically inaccurate movies.