The Quill

Quick Updates for Independent Lifelong Learners

August 9, 2026

#621

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NEWS

LLAIC Course Registration Ongoing

Regis College LLARC Fall Course Registration Ongoing



SPECIAL EVENTS

Summersession continues on Tuesday, August 11 @ 10:30

LLAIC PICNIC New date is Thursday, August 13 @11:30

Let's Go: Charles River Museum of Industry, Friday, August 14 

Summersession continues on Zoom, August 18, 10:00-11:30

Getting to Know Us Session, August 25

Dinner Theater: "Rhinoceros," American Repertory Theater, Sept. 9

Save the Date:  "Purpose" at the Calderwood, Sunday, October 11


AFFINITY GROUPS

French Conversation Group, August 20

On summer vacation: La Tertulia, LLAIC Lit-Lovers, Movie Mavens


To join LLAIC: click here

NEWS

Schedule-at-a-Glance


FALL COURSE REGISTRATION IS STILL GOING ON


Registration for fall courses began on Monday morning, July 20th. Many courses are still available, so sign up before they fill up! Make sure you are a current LLAIC member before then. Also make sure you have your username and password to log in. 
Click here
to go directly to the course registration page. 
Click here for a short guide to help you with registering.


In the unlikely event that your first-choice course is full, put your name on the waitlist. If you run into difficulty, call one of our helpers listed below. And if their line is busy or there's no answer, call another one!


  • Phyllis Cohen 508 651 9630
  • Carole Levy 781 929 9710 
  • Richard Mansfield 978 443 4404  
  • Bill Miniscalco 978 394 1870
  • Peter Schmidt 339 223 3973


If you would prefer to register for membership and/or courses by mail, contact Richard Mansfield at 978-443-4404 or richardscottmansfield@gmail.com and he will send you the forms.


Our course schedule and full course descriptions are available on our website. Each course is listed by day, by period, and by course leader. If you click on the course name, you will get a full description, including the dates, times, location (Zoom or in person), amount of preparation, etc. If you click on the course leader’s name, you will find their bio. Click here for the class dates, and click here for the Schedule-at-a-Glance.


REGIS COLLEGE LLARC

FALL COURSE REGISTRATION

IS ONGOING


As part of our ongoing collaboration with LLARC (Lifelong Learning at Regis College), LLARC courses listed on their website here are open to LLAIC members for registration. Some LLARC courses will be on Zoom and some in person at Regis College in Weston. Click here for detailed instructions on how to sign up for up to two LLARC courses.


If you have any difficulty with registration, contact Bill, Peter, or Shelly.

SPECIAL EVENTS

Free to LLAIC Members

"

TUESDAY, AUGUST 11, 2026



SUMMER SESSION CONTINUES


Summersession continues this week in person at Temple Shalom with two very interesting topics:

 

The 10:30 am presentation is: Ethics with Richard Mansfield   


Richard Mansfield will do a brief presentation on ethics and lead a discussion of some ethical situations, including:

  1. Would you choose to divert a runaway trolley, so that it kills only one person instead of the five that it is barreling towards.
  2. Would you approve of mercy killing of newborn infants with a hopeless prognosis who are undergoing unbearable suffering?
  3. What issues are proposed by “fake news” such as the claim circulated in 2016 that Hillary Clinton was involved in child abuse.
  4. Is it okay to reject the scientific consensus about the cause of an epidemic-causing disease?
  5. What, if anything, did Germany owe to the tens of thousands of displaced refugees seeking asylum?


The I:00 pm presentation is: The Famous Liberty Ship with David Rabinowitz


The Liberty Ships were more than cargo vessels—they were a turning point in WWII. This presentation reveals how a simple design became the backbone of the Allied victory and why the Liberty Ships remain one of history’s greater industrial achievements.


All Summersession programs are drop-in, no advance registration necessary. Come for the morning or afternoon or both, and of course no charge. Bring your lunch (or can email Jen here to order pizza) and join us for the day in our lovely air-conditioned “Schmooze Room.” Why not even bring a few friends and introduce them to LLAIC? 

LLAIC ANNUAL PICNIC

Thursday, August 13 @ 11:30 A.M.

LYONS PARK, NEWTON


LLAIC’s thrice rescheduled annual picnic will be held starting at 11:30 on August 13 at Lyons Park (GPS: 104 West Pine St., Newton). Bring something for yourself to eat and something to share. Bring some large plastic tablecloths if you have any!


Directions: From Rte 95, take the Rte 30 East exit, and follow Commonwealth Ave. about ¾ mile. Turn left on Melrose Street, go about ¼ mile, then left on West Pine St. Go to the end and park near sign, “Auburndale Playground. The Cove.” Walk through the opening in the fence and follow the pathway to the left about 250 feet to the Ryan Picnic Area. There are about 30 picnic tables, mostly shaded. 

SUMMERSESSION CONTINUES ON ZOOM

TUESDAY AUGUST 18 10:00-11:30 AM

with Len Glassman


"The Republican Party from Reagan to Trump:

Where the Right Went Wrong"


This presentation will cover the evolution of the Republican Party from Reagan through the presidencies of both George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush, both terms of Trump as well as including the effects of the intervening Democratic presidencies. Focus will be on the influences, political and cultural, that have led the Republican Party to where it is today and how to find a path back to normalcy.


Click here by August 17th for an invitation

CHARLES RIVER MUSEUM OF INDUSTRY

Friday, August 14th at 11 A.M.

BREWERS TAP AND TABLE, 256 Moody St., Waltham

Located in the Francis Cabot Lowell Mill, 154 Moody Street, Waltham, an icon of the American Industrial Revolution, the Charles River Museum of Industry & Innovation brings together intriguing artifacts, cultural insights, and inspiring stories to delight people of all ages.


We will meet at the museum at 11:00 for a one-hour tour. If coming from Moody St., the museum is set back from the street.  There is a tall smokestack above the museum. There is no parking at the museum, but there is parking at the Embassy Theater parking lot, which is on the opposite side of the Charles River.  There is an easy footbridge for visitors to walk from the parking lot over the river to the museum.    A detailed description of parking options is available on the museum website.  Note: there are stairs to the 2nd floor, but the majority of the exhibits are on the 1st floor.


After the tour we will walk up to Moody Street, where we’ll meet for lunch at the Brewer’s Tap and Table, on the corner of Moody Street and Pine Street. We’ll meet there at 12:30. They serve a nice variety of American pub food.  A 20% gratuity will be automatically added to the bill so we can have individual checks.



Please fill out the registration form attached here and send it in if you plan to join us.  Note: we will limit the number of registrations to 20 for this tour.


Registration for Charles River Museum trip.

INVITE YOUR FRIENDS!

 To our Getting to Know Us Session

 August 15   10-11 am   Zoom

   RSVP by August 23 to membership@llaic.org


We have something for everyone, so please invite your friends to learn more about our lifelong learning program (LLAIC) and all that we offer. We have affordable classes and enrichment programs for seniors interested in ongoing learning and socializing. Registration is ongoing and classes are filling up quickly.


Engage Your Mind and Enrich Your Life this Fall with LLAIC!

DINNER THEATER GROUP

"RHINOCEROS"

AMERICAN REPERTORY THEATER

September 9, 2026 at 2:00 P.M.

WAIT LIST ONLY


We are excited to have a limited number of tickets to the American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) production of “Rhinoceros,” starring Paul Giamatti and John Turturro, on Wednesday, September 9th at 2:00 p.m. Tickets cost $30.00 each.


The story: Everything seems normal one Sunday morning…until it’s not. One by one, friends and colleagues transform into rhinoceroses, and Berenger is forced to decide: will he follow the crowd or stand his ground?


Contact Shelly or Andrea if you would like to be on the wait list.

THEATER LOVERS--SAVE THE DATE

"PURPOSE" AT THE CALDERWOOD

SUNDAY OCTOBER 11 at 2:00 P.M.


The LLAIC dinner-theater committee has excellent tickets for the Pulitzer Prize winning drama “Purpose” at the Calderwood Theater on Sunday Oct 11th for the 2:00pm matinee. Details will be available in the Quill in a few weeks. 

AFFINITY GROUP MEETINGS

Free to LLAIC Members

FRENCH CONVERSATION

GROUP

Monday, August 10 @ 1:30 P.M.


On April 13, we started reading short stories from the book French Stories/Contes Francais: A Dual-Language Book, edited by Wallace Fowlie. We’ve started with the first story, Micromégas, by Voltaire. 


You can see a link to the Kindle version of the book on Amazon here. Once there, you can click a box on the right to order it in paperback. CAUTION: There are other similar DUAL LANGUAGE books edited by Wallace Fowlie. Be sure to buy the edition with “Ten Short Stories by Voltaire, Balzac, Gide, Camus …” et. al., available from Amazon for Kindle or in paperback.



The complete list of stories is included in the description. You can see the actual table of contents by clicking on the “Read sample” link just below the picture of the book’s cover. It seems to take you to the FORWARD; if so, you must click the < arrow on the left side to move back through the table. You can also scan to the right and read almost all of the first story, 


We meet for an hour and a half by ZOOM every other Monday at 1:30 p.m. We are intermediate to advanced French readers who read the French text out loud and discuss the stories in French. Please email Betty Salzberg if you would like to join us. 

Learn more about LLAIC at www.llaic.org

Call us: (508) 453-1205

Write us: info@llaic.org


Editor: Barbara Mende

Contributing Editor: Shelly Levine

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