We're so excited to start telling you the details about OLLI All Year, starting in Fall 2023! If you’ve been to class at The Social Chico this week, you’ve seen our OLLI All Year posters, pictured.

The highlights:

Visit the OLLI All Year page on our website for all the details. Or contact the OLLI office at [email protected] or 530-898-6679 with any questions.

This spring, Rosie Potestio offered the class Conversations on the Tao Te Ching. OLLI member Paul Coots said, "I feel so fortunate to know Rosie. She is guiding us through Tao Te Ching's philosophy about the flow of life and how it's always changing."

Instructors are just as important as the content they teach. "I'm benefiting not only by learning more about these teachings, but from a person who has knowledge of this philosophy and can clearly communicate with our class," Paul said. "Rosie teaches from her heart and has a passion for her subject. Rosie is perhaps the most down-to-earth person you would ever want to be around. She is what OLLI is about: truth, passion, and resilience."

OLLI is also about connecting with other people. OLLI member Jim Salber appreciates the way Rosie's teaching makes this happen. "Rosie allows us, the students, to get to know each other through breakout groups."

Pictured: Part of a Taoist manuscript, ink on silk, 2nd century BCE, Han Dynasty, unearthed from Mawangdui tomb 3rd, Chansha, Hunan Province, China. Hunan Province Museum.

Spring may have just officially begun, but it's already time to start thinking about what you want to teach this fall!

OLLI is looking for volunteers to lead a class for the Fall '23 term! Fall '23 will be the first term in our new schedule of three ten-week terms each year. You can teach in one, two, or all three terms in a year, and your class can meet just once, every one of the ten weeks, or anything in between.

We are accepting class proposals now through April 10. Join us!

Want to teach online but don’t have a Zoom account or a teaching space? No problem! We can start your Zoom meetings for you, get you a Zoom account at no cost, or provide you with space and a computer in the OLLI office to teach your class.

Submit a Fall '23 Class Proposal now or contact us for more information at [email protected] or 530-898-6679.

Pictured: OLLI Instructor Dick Kennedy teaching a drawing class, Summer '18. Photo by Chico State photographer Jason Halley.

The OLLI Play Festival, now in its 8th year, will return to the in-person stage this June. Several short comedies are written, directed, and acted by OLLI members. Join in the fun!

Plays Due: April 7

Auditions: April 17-18

For more information, including submission guidelines, please contact Pam Loyd at [email protected].

The 2023 Online Play Festival links will be released soon.

Pictured: Actors rehearsing for The Perils of the Pink Envelope on Zoom.

In 2018, OLLI member and book lover Maureen Fredrickson donated a bright red library cart to start the OLLI Book Exchange. The cart is easy to spot in the lobby outside the Bradley 2 classroom at The Social Chico.

Members can browse the cart at any time and take a book. You can also donate your books to the cart for other members to read. We ask that you take only one book home at a time, but you can leave as many as you want.

Members have left fiction, nonfiction, and magazine back issues for you to peruse and take home to read. If you're having trouble choosing a book, take a couple with you across the lobby to Café 1400 and have a cup of coffee while you read the first chapter of each one.

Mike and Mary McCluskey recently spoke with Chico News & Review reporter Ken Smith to tell their story. They’ve led an eventful life – you’ll have to read the article for all the details – and settled in Chico in 2012.

In addition to their personal history, Mike and Mary highlighted their love of OLLI. They both take and teach OLLI classes with a strong commitment to lifelong learning. You can read the article online or look for the March issue of the Chico News & Review on stands around town.

Pictured: Mary and Mike McCluskey leading tai chi in the park.

About four years ago, the doctors at Chico Eye Center realized they had outgrown their clinic and were going to need to do something about it. According to Dr. Pablo Arregui, they looked at occupying an existing space, but they soon realized that the only way they would be able to continue to provide the level of care their patients have come to expect would be to build a completely new clinic space from the ground up.

After looking at the layout of several new eye clinics around the country and in consulting with several architects, every aspect of the new construction was made with the patient at the center. The new Chico Eye Center at 3401 Esplanade sits on north Esplanade across from DeGarmo Park. From the improved parking, to the way the lobby invites you in, to the way that the open clinic layout allows for a more comfortable and efficient flow, the patient experience has been improved in every aspect.

The new clinic not only allows the surgeons to collaborate with each other, they are also able to provide IntraLase bladeless LASIK as well as perform minor surgeries, procedures, and treatments with the latest state-of-the-art equipment, technology, and training. The larger space will also help to recruit specialists, like fellowship-trained pediatric ophthalmologist Dr. Kristianne Ransbarger and fellowship-trained corneal surgeon Dr. Sean Liston, to Chico so patients won’t have to go out of the area to seek care.

Chico Eye Center has supported our community with its sponsorship of OLLI and it continues to support its patients with all the benefits of its new clinic.

The Butte College Native American Center will host Big Time, a social gathering in celebration of Native American people and cultures next week.

The event will feature feather dancers, a drum group, Native American craft and jewelry vendors, food, traditional games, and an elders basket giveaway. Special guest Supaman, award winning Apsáalooke rapper and ghost/thunder dancer, will perform at 12:30pm.

Butte College Main Campus

Free and open to the public!

OLLI will be closed on March 31 for Cesar Chavez Day. The day is a California state holiday and a federal commemorative holiday celebrating the birth and legacy of labor leader and civil rights activist Cesar Chavez.

Chavez worked for the rights of farm workers. He co-founded the National Farmworkers Association (NFWA) with fellow labor leader and civil rights activist Dolores Huerta. The predominantly Mexican NFWA joined the predominantly Filipino Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC) in their strike against grape growers in Delano, California, in 1965. The two unions merged in 1966 and changed the union's name to the United Farm Workers Union in 1972. The Delano grape strike, with its associated consumer boycott, lasted five years and resulted in first of their kind contracts between growers and farmworker unions.

President Barack Obama first endorsed the idea of a national holiday to honor Chavez when he was a senator in 2008, saying, "Chavez left a legacy as an educator, environmentalist, and a civil rights leader. And his cause lives on. As farm workers and laborers across America continue to struggle for fair treatment and fair wages, we find strength in what Cesar Chavez accomplished so many years ago." In 2014, President Obama officially proclaimed Cesar Chavez Day to be a federal commemorative holiday.

In Leader to Elder: Reflections on Life Change, Dr. Janet Rechtman explores the origin of personality types and how these broad characterizations present an either-or version of a much more multi-faceted reality. In contrast to the traditional notion of leadership as getting others to get things done, there is another path that involves a commitment to service and a deeper appreciation of the challenges aging presents to people who are used to being in command and control.

Whether or not you held an official leadership position in the past, this class focuses on what to do in retirement with all the experience, wisdom, ambition, and energy you once gave to your pre-retirement life purpose. It’s time to turn that type-A attention to the transition from leader to elder by attending this reflective half-day workshop on April 10.

One way to explore your emerging path is to volunteer as a member of the board of directors of a nonprofit organization whose work is important to you. Janet is also teaching an already in progress class about Nonprofit Board Governance, which you are welcome to join. Board membership is a blend of the power of command and control and the opportunities of service. In other words, board service is an excellent way for aging leaders to learn how to come to terms constructively with the changes in their lives.

Good news! The deadline to receive discounted pricing has been extended to April 5!

Collette Representative Jay Fehan visited us in January to talk about the upcoming fully-guided tour to Ireland in Fall 2023. He provided more details about this OLLI-exclusive adventure, with captivating slides of the areas we'll be visiting.

Laura Taylor, MSPAS, PA-C, will bring her experience with older adults to our Community Speaker Series on Thursday, April 6, 3-4pm, for a talk about the most common skin related complaints that come with the aging process. Laura will tell us about what she sees in her office on a regular basis with patients over 50. She’ll review the most common conditions and concerns along with treatment options and when to worry. She hopes to bring better awareness and education to the community to help aid people in being more proactive with their health care.

Laura Taylor is a physician assistant-certified with experience in family medicine and skin care. After earning a Master of Science in Physician Assistant Studies at Missouri State University, she was commissioned as a captain in the United States Air Force and continued her work and training at Pearl Harbor-Hickam AFB, Hawaii. She later transferred to David Grant Medical Group at Travis Air Force Base, where she continued to hone her skills in skin care before relocating to Chico following the end of her service commitment.

Free and open to the public! This hybrid event will take place in Bradley 2 at The Social Chico and over Zoom. Check the OLLI website the day of the event for the Zoom link. Proof of vaccination is required for all in-person events. Click here for instructions.

The California Native Plant Society, Mount Lassen Chapter, presents an evening with author, educator, naturalist, and retired state park interpreter Mike Hubbartt. Mike is the author of The Sutter Buttes, an Arcadia Publishing Images of America book.

Mike will take you on a visual tour around and through the interior of the Sutter Buttes with plenty of time for questions.

Butte County Library, Chico Branch

Free and open to the public!

The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Boise State University invites members from other OLLIs to join them for three upcoming lectures. The deadline to register is March 27.

Juergen Thieme

The National Synchrotron Light Source II at Brookhaven National Laboratory creates light beams 10 billion times brighter than the sun. Learn more about the uses of this light and X-rays in a wide range of scientific areas.

Doug Myers

Learn about the history of public health and its impact on the health of the population. This lecture will also discuss forces contributing to better health, such as improved sanitation and nutrition, medical advances, and economic development.

Toby King

Get a high-level overview of what you need to know to protect your digital information from being compromised. Device management, password management, and best practices will be covered.

Pictured: Juergen Thieme at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Photo used under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Autism is a developmental disability that affects how autistic people experience the world. As with any population of people, there is a wide variety among autistic people. Autistic people can be any age, race, or gender. Different autistic people may need a different level of support in their day-to-day lives.

The UN adopted a resolution declaring April 2 World Autism Awareness Day beginning in 2008. In 2011, Paula C. Durbin Westby, an autistic disability rights activist, started Autism Acceptance Day. "I stated in my original writings about Autism Acceptance Day that acceptance does not mean 'I accept you, but not your autism.' Acceptance is: pro-neurodiversity, a focus on supports and services tailored to the needs of the Autistic individual, rejection of cure-oriented projects."

The Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) motto is "Nothing About Us Without Us." They have developed the freely available book Welcome to the Autistic Community that gives an overview of autism, disability and neurodiversity, and both self-advocacy for autistic people and how to be an ally for non-autistic people.

Cesar Chavez Day (OLLI Closed, No Classes)

Last Day of Spring Classes

Summer Kickoff Picnic

Summer Class Registration Opens

Memorial Day (OLLI Closed)

First Day of Summer Classes

Juneteenth (OLLI Office Closed)

Last Day of Summer Classes

If you have something to say, a photo to share, or a question to pose to the editor, you can submit information using our OLLI Newsletter Submission form.