In this session, the facilitator will draw on experience organizing three summer programs—COSMO, a motor control summer school; Neuromatch, a large-scale, three-week online program; and Neuro4Pros, a faculty-only summer school. The presentation will outline how each program is structured, the learning philosophies that guide them, and the practical decisions that shape participant experience. By comparing these user-centric approaches to conventional teaching at Penn, the session highlights why these summer schools feel so different, what they reveal about effective learning environments, and how their principles can inform everyday teaching practices.

All graduate students are welcome. This event grows out of concerns in the Bioengineering department, and so may be most useful to students in related fields.

Counts toward the CETLI Teaching Certificate.