Never before have so many people been capable of doing so much to make the world better. Increasingly, new technologies and new ideas allow us to share great innovations and to deliver sustainable change.
And as this conversation gets broader, it also needs to get deeper. That's why the 92nd Street Y has partnered with Wesleyan University to launch a free MOOC (massive open online course), "How to Change the World," which starts next week on Martin Luther King Day, Jan. 20.
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This MOOC grew out of the annual Social Good Summit, a partnership between Mashable, the 92Y, the U.N. Foundation, UNDP, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Ericsson.
You can sign up right now, for free, on Coursera. Along with over 40,000 others, you'll learn more about the big global issues - climate, gender equality, education and more. Most importantly, you'll develop strategies for working with others to help address these challenges.
Each week, we'll be asking three big questions: What do we know? Why should we care? What can we do? Here's an outline of what we'll cover:
Week 1: What are social goods?
Week 2: Poverty, Prosperity and Aid
Week 3: Climate Change and Sustainability
Week 4: Disease and Global Health Care
Week 5: Women, Education and Social Change
Week 6: Education, Social Networks and Activism
"Our aim is simple and bold: to put together the facts, the energy and the actions to make a real difference in addressing some of the major problems confronting the world today," says Wesleyan President Michael Roth, who will lead the course.
We look forward to learning with you.
Image: Andrew Burton/Getty Images