Emmanuel Kasigazi and Michael Jordan Pilgreen, two avid fans of open learning, talk about how they discovered MIT OpenCourseWare, how that discovery changed their lives, and how they’re teaming up to help other learners from around the world share their own stories.
Emmanuel Kasigazi is a data scientist from Kampala, Uganda. Michael Jordan Pilgreen is a financial technology engineer from Memphis, Tennessee. Kasigazi and Pilgreen know firsthand how transformative open learning can be: Pilgreen’s discovery of the free educational materials at MIT OpenCourseWare helped him develop new technical skills and eventually led to a new career in a field he is passionate about, while Kasigazi has enjoyed MIT OpenCourseWare’s wealth of lecture videos on YouTube for years, not only to learn within his field but also to immerse himself in the deep questions of psychology and philosophy. In this episode we hear from Kasigazi and Pilgreen about how open learning changed their lives and how they became friends and colleagues despite living on opposite sides of the world. We also hear of their new project, in which they’ll be teaming up to host an upcoming special season of Chalk Radio. Unlike the typical Chalk Radio season, which focuses on the supply side of open learning, featuring interviews with inspired educators at MIT, this special “Open Learners” podcast season will focus on candid conversations with open learners from all over the world. This special season is coming Fall 2024. Don’t miss it!
Relevant Resources:
Emmanuel Kasigazi - Open Learning Story
Michael Jordan Pilgreen - Open Learning Story
Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions
Share Your Open Learning Story
To share your own open learning story with Michael and Emmanuel, send them an email at open_learners_pod@mit.edu.
[MUSIC PLAYING] EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: When I got my first smartphone, and I landed on YouTube, I went looking for answers to some of the questions I had. And then I found this entire world of people who actually had answers and all this other knowledge that was out there for free.
SARAH HANSEN: I'm Sarah Hansen. For this episode of Chalk Radio, I sat down with two very special guests.
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: Hi, I'm Emmanuel Olimi Kasigazi. I'm a data scientist, a creative, a learner, an AI expert. I'm from Kampala, Uganda, East Africa.
MICHAEL JORDAN PILGREEN: Hi, I'm Michael Jordan Pilgreen. And I'm from Memphis, Tennessee. I'm a learner and educator, an engineer and a bridge builder. And it's a pleasure to be here today.
SARAH HANSEN: Michael and Emmanuel are two of the millions of people who have used MIT OpenCourseWare in their journeys as lifelong learners. After connecting with OCW, they connected with each other and are now good friends, despite living on two different continents. In this conversation, they explain how they've both used OCW to transform their lives. And later, they tell us about the Open Learners podcast, an exciting new season of Chalk Radio that they're hosting that will bring stories like theirs to listeners and learners around the world.
So what exactly is an open learner?
MICHAEL JORDAN PILGREEN: So an open learner can be a lot of things, I think. Emmanuel and I, within the context of OpenCourseWare and MIT specifically, think it's anybody that is engaging with material in hopes of learning anything. And we specify we call it Open Learners, because going back to when we first met, being from Memphis, Tennessee, and Emmanuel from Kampala, Uganda, it was so fascinating that we both had experienced a certain level of anti-intellectualism growing up.
And I think as adults, we're both at the point now where we can be open about learning. And I know that's a weird concept to wrap your brain around, but it finally feels good and accepted. It is something to be proud about, being proud of being a learner.
Everybody comes out of a four-year degree nowadays, especially in the United States, and they think they need to be an expert, and they try to put on this persona that they do know everything. And it's OK to admit, I don't. And I'm willing and open about the fact that I'm still learning.
SARAH HANSEN: I was curious to know how Michael and Emmanuel's learning journeys eventually led them to MIT OpenCourseWare.
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: I've always been interested in finding out how things work and more so how we work as human beings. I know this is going to sound cliche, but I was that kid who used to look up at the stars and wonder what all of this is. What are we? What is consciousness? What is life? How come I can talk and that tree can't.
And the further I grew up, the more I went looking for these answers to these questions. That further led me to the path of psychology, philosophy, and trying to answer the great questions of the world. How I got to OCW was that through my hobbies, what I like, I came through psychology.
I was trying to just, at any point in life, at any stage in my life, I always have a psychological kind of thing that I'm watching or studying, just for my own interests, just to try and understand. I'm still on this journey trying to understand who we are, what the world is, and the whys, the hows, the great questions of the world. I'm still on that journey.
MICHAEL JORDAN PILGREEN: I was led to Open Learning and MIT OpenCourseWare during a very stressful and desperate part of my life. I am trained as a poet from my undergrad degree. During the COVID 19 pandemic, all the artwork jobs out there, both public and private facing, evaporated overnight. And I had to figure out what was next.
And I found an introduction to finance course by Andrew Lo. And I fell in love with his charisma and his ability to captivate an audience. And that led me to discovering Gary Gensler, the SEC commissioner. And I was just shocked that he had multiple courses online for free, where he's articulating and dialoguing with students in a masterful way about capital markets.
Even for people that may not be interested in capital markets, he was able to digest these very complex, interconnected concepts and simplify them in a way that everyday learners could interact with. And that fascinated me, and it encouraged me to continue down the financial technology path.
SARAH HANSEN: So how exactly did these two open learners connect and end up co-hosting a special season of Chalk Radio?
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: So after watching the psychology lessons, because this was one of the most profound, like I said, I'd been doing courses on this, but not from the top, top institutions. So when I found the top institution, it was honestly different. So I was like, this is amazing. Does this professor know what he's doing for the world?
And I remember sitting one day. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to thank this person when I'm done with these courses because this is something groundbreaking. So when I saw the psychology professor, I wrote out to him thank you for this amazing course. You're doing amazing work. I just wanted to thank the professor. And then Curt wrote me back.
SARAH HANSEN: For those of you who are new to the podcast, the Curt he's referring to here is Curt Newton, the director of MIT OpenCourseWare.
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: And she asked if they could share my story. I didn't understand what that meant at the time, but I was like, OK, cool. And then in that email, they sent me a link to my course story. We're going to write a story about you, and it's a story like this one.
So one day I'm playing around my LinkedIn, and I see an invitation from Michael. I'm like, wait, I know this gentleman, so I accept the invitation. Then I write him back. I'm like, thank you for inspiring us. I saw your story. It was a great piece, thank you. And Michael wrote back, do you want to get on a call? I was like, why not?
So we get on the call. I remember that day my power even went out, [LAUGHS] yeah. So I had this laptop that had 20% battery left. I was like, either way, I'm taking this call. If we talk for only five minutes, it's OK.
So we talk. It blew my mind that this person across the continent. But then as we kept talking, we found that we have similar interests. We both have a background in arts. We both love philosophy and psychology. We are both on this journey to transition our careers. And it just mind blowing to me. And what brought all this together was this platform, this OCW platform. And since then, we've been talking almost every week.
SARAH HANSEN: Here at OCW, we love how Open Learning and Open Education can forge the kinds of relationships that Michael and Emmanuel have. It inspired an idea. How could we amplify this community-building effect of Open Learning to even more people? And so a new podcast was born.
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EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: We are just trying to do or give people what me and Michael experienced. These were two people from two separate continents, other side of the world, hours apart. But then you get to talking, and then you find you have similar interests, and now you get to know this person, and then you get to start this commune with this person. They become your friend. They become your mentor. They become your colleague.
MICHAEL JORDAN PILGREEN: Building that community and that connection between learners across the world, despite everything, despite differentiated contexts and different lifestyles, all these things that people are still fundamentally the same and going through the same struggles, going through the same self doubts when approaching learning, really giving a platform for people to continue to share their stories and hopefully, that will serve as inspiration along the way for other learners, right? Just another support system to know that you're not alone in this journey.
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: When you're going to learn, it's about the people that you can go along with because in schools, that's easy. You're all in one community, you're in one space, but on-line learning and Open Learning as a whole, it's kind of vague, and it's not so clear written. But in school, I'm in class with 70 people. So that's what we're trying to give people with this Open Learning platform.
MICHAEL JORDAN PILGREEN: Also, maybe learning in your culture is an act of defiance, especially given the global context, not everybody can just openly learn whatever they want and I think an inspiration for change.
EMMANUEL KASIGAZI: We are looking at talking to people from every continent, every background, every culture, whichever tradition is constrained, those who can learn, those who can't learn, just to make them know that whatever it is you're going through, it's scary, yes, but you're not alone. Here's another person from the other side of the continent who went through the same thing, and they made it, and it was OK. And we just want you to know that. And that's the purpose of Open Learning.
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SARAH HANSEN: If you're interested in sharing your Open Learning story with Michael and Emmanuel and maybe being featured on their upcoming podcast, please send them an email at open_learners_pod@mit.edu. We are so excited to launch this special season and to share more stories like Michael and Emmanuel's with the world, so stay tuned to this podcast feed for updates.
Thank you so much for listening. Until next time, signing off from Cambridge, Massachusetts I'm your host, Sarah Hansen from MIT OpenCourseWare at ocw.mit.edu. Chalk Radio's producers include myself, Brett Paci, and Dave Lishansky. Show notes for this episode were written by Peter Chipman. Jason Player made our episode cassette animation on YouTube. We are funded by MIT Open Learning and supporters like you.
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