As higher education institutions wrestle with the future of massive open online courses, or MOOCs, the University of Pennsylvania will host the third annual conference focused on online learning, Oct. 6-7. 

“Learning with MOOCs III: Being and Learning in a Digital Age” will feature two keynote speakers: the founder of Girls Who Code, Reshma Saujani, and Angela Duckworth, the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Psychology at Penn and author of the current New York Times bestseller Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. 

The conference will address such questions such as: how do MOOCs and digital learning impact learners across the lifespan from birth to retirement? What are the challenges of integrating multi-source data streams to present a holistic view of learner engagement and performance? Should social and emotional skills and character strengths be considered in digital learning?  

Topics will also include the future of wearable technology, the importance of social and affective learning, what successful MOOC learning looks like, and how educators can evaluate MOOCs qualitatively. 

“Penn faculty have been among the pioneers in open learning,” said Penn Provost Vincent Price, General Chair of the conference, “and their experiences with MOOCs have productively informed teaching and learning on our own campus. We are very pleased to bring together the wider community of innovative scholars and practitioners who are collectively advancing the next phases of online learning and helping to define our exciting digital future.”

To register for the conference, view the program, and learn more about Penn’s Online Learning Initiative, please visit: http://www.learningwithmoocs2016.org.