Coursera course inspires student to apply to Penn

The Daily Pennsylvanian
March 18, 2014

Taha Tariq is now involved with the Writers House, as part of The Body Electric and the publication 'Reader'.

College freshman Taha Tariq’s journey to Penn began with an online Coursera course.

While researching Penn, Tariq discovered Modern Poetry, an online course taught by Professor Al Filreis on Coursera, a free platform for Massive Open Online Courses, commonly known as MOOCs. During the class, Filreis leads a virtual discussion from the Kelly Writers House on campus and online students complete quizzes and participate in discussion threads at their leisure.

As the Faculty Director at the Writers House, Filreis has turned his class, known as “ModPo,” into a veritable phenomenon. Conducted entirely online, Filreis teaches this course to more than 40,000 students at a time. New Coursera courses typically attract under 10,000, Filreis said.

Read the full article here.