Looking Back on Fall Fest 2024
The Penn Engineering Online team was lucky to spend time this Fall with hundreds of online graduate students celebrating their annual Fall Fest on Penn’s campus. This special conference event provides an opportunity for students in online master’s degree programs to visit the University and connect in person with classmates, alumni, faculty and staff.
The first Fall Fest took place in 2022 and the event has continued to grow with each annual iteration. In 2024, attendance reached 214 students which included guests registered from 19 countries of citizenship and students who are actively studying from 10 countries.
The flexibility of Penn Engineering’s online graduate programs enables students to enroll in world-renowned Ivy League master’s degrees from anywhere, at any time, while they schedule their courses at a pace that fits their unique part-time or full-time enrollment needs. Due to this flexibility, which allows working professionals and busy adult learners to study while also juggling the other important commitments in their lives, the Penn Engineering Online student body has attracted a diverse community of students who come from a wide range of international time zones, personal backgrounds and professional experiences.
Having the opportunity to gather this widely dispersed student body for a weekend of in-person camaraderie is a cherished annual tradition for the Penn Engineering Online community. Nearly 96% of the 2024 Fall Fest attendees had attended another Fall Fest event in the past, so there were many participants eager to reunite with classmates and professors who they rarely get to see in person, but are often in touch with digitally.
Participants of the 2024 festivities were able to enjoy 3 days of building and strengthening connections with their peers and professors. The weekend’s itinerary included tours around campus, including research centers, labs and landmarks such as the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library and Kaskey Park. The Fall Fest program also highlighted presentations by 6 members of the Penn Engineering faculty that spanned a wide range of subjects:
Brandon Krakowsky: How to Use Data
This session provided an overview of one of Penn Engineering Online’s newest courses, EAS 5740: “How to Use Data”, which explores working with data to gain insights, make predictions, and solve business problems while diving into the data analytics process – including wrangling, cleaning, exploration and modeling.
Dr. James C. Gee and Pratik Chaudhari: Why Can We Learn?
This discussion explored how a characteristic structure in the space of learnable tasks on natural data lies at the heart of the remarkable success of deep learning; the implications such a structure has for our understanding of learning in biological organisms and machines; and the applications of learning in diverse domains.
Dr. Tom Farmer: Doctoral Studies
Dr. Tom Farmer, MCIT Online Program Director, hosted this session for graduate students interested in expanding their education after their master’s degree. They discussed the structure of doctoral programs, how to secure funding sources for your PhD program and how to choose dissertation topics.
Dr. Chris Callison-Burch: Generative AI and ChatGPT
Generative AI has continued to have remarkable breakthroughs since the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November 2022. Dr. Chris Callison-Burch, MSE-AI Online Program Director, invited some of his PhD students to join a discussion of LLMs and their implications in an interactive session featuring audience Q&A.
Bongho Kim: 6G Technologies
The 6G vision translates into rigorous performance requirements that require network infrastructure components and distributing the vast computational needs. This session explored a “Distributed AI Service” system – a strategic advancement in utilizing distributed computing principles within AI / ML frameworks.
In addition to these insightful faculty sessions, Fall Fest attendees were able to join presentations and networking with key stakeholders on the Penn Engineering staff. These opportunities highlighted important resources and programs that are available to support online graduate students, including Academic Advising and Career Services. Some sessions took a dive into student teaching and mentorship opportunities including the Teaching Assistant, Teaching and Learning Practicum and Academic Coach programs. Alternative sessions invited alumni and current students to participate in panel discussions to share insights into their experience with programs like Technical Interview Coaching, the SPARC Competition, the Road Trips program and internships.
Following a busy day of seminars, presentations and discussions, Fall Fest attendees were invited to enjoy an evening of socializing over a dinner that featured keynote remarks from Kevin B. Johnson, MD, MS. Dr. Johnson is an award-winning biomedical researcher, teacher, and leader who is internationally respected as a pioneer in the development of clinical information systems that improve patient safety and health quality. He teaches as a Professor here at Penn in the School of Engineering and Applied Science, the Perelman School of Medicine, and the Annenberg School for Communication. His remarks featured an exploration of how artificial intelligence can reinvent the process of a clinical encounter and showcased Dr. Johnson’s recent work through his Artificial Intelligence for Ambulatory Care Innovation Lab. Following this riveting and insightful presentation, guests enjoyed a performance by Penn Masala. The night was capped with time for mingling with classmates and exploring the city of Philadelphia.
The weekend was capped with a relaxing day spent on campus enjoying the sunshine and all of the components of a great picnic: lawn games, good food and even better company. The Penn Engineering team is appreciative of everyone in the Penn Engineering Online community who traveled to Philadelphia from around the world to join them and make the weekend so memorable. Everyone is already counting down to next year’s gathering and, in the meantime, is looking forward to staying connected through our vibrant online community.
View select photos from Fall Fest below or explore the full gallery here.
fall fest 2024
