Online Learning in Pursuit of Happiness

May marked two years since graduating with my Masters in Museum Studies. I'm finding it much harder to "deaccession the student" as I am continuously seeking out new learning opportunities. Or perhaps I've just deaccessioned to another institution - the internet. At present, I'm enrolled in two massive open online classes (or MOOCs for short) - one for work and one for personal interest. For work, I'm completing a course on Digital Badges through Course Sites. For my personal interest, I'm taking a class in Leadership through Canvas.net.

Over the course of the last few months, I've discovered that I have a passion for women's leadership and online learning. Thus my interest in these two online courses. I think there's an opportunity to combine these two interests as I pursue future educational and career opportunities. For example, at work, we'd like to branch out into providing digital badges and also work on developing a STEM program for girls. Increased educational opportunities have been linked to increased success for women.

At the same time, I'm leading two special groups through the meetup group I manage: STL Nerdy Girls. One group is working on The Happiness Project - a book written on maximizing happiness in your daily life. The other group is a Lean In group for the leaders of STL Nerdy Girls. Part of my Happiness Project is to explore my interests through online learning. My interest in the Lean In group is to explore women's leadership in a practical and supportive manner. I hope to compare my experiences in the Lean In group to my experiences in the LeaderMOOC, as well as share those resources from my LeaderMOOC with the STL Nerdy Girls.

For the next few months, I'll be blogging my responses to assignments in my MOOCs and talking about the future of online learning in the context of museums, feminism and informal education. In addition, I'll focus on how my Happiness Project and Lean In Groups are going.