Peter Norvig is known to many from his pioneering work on Massive Open Online Courses, or so-called MOOCs. With his colleague Sebastian Thrun, he set up an open course at Stanford University, in Artificial Intelligence in 2011, finding to his surprise that 165000 students signed up. How does one deal with those numbers? What is that experience like? And how does he understand the future of learning and education in a mediatized world? 

At the World Learning Summit in 2016, you will have a chance to hear for yourself. Peter is the chief scientist at Google, in Silicon Valley. He was employer number 8 in the company. He has also taught extensively, among other places at UC Berkeley. He was part of our 2015 conference at Stanford University, where he summarised his general impression after having heard how education leaders from a dozen US universities now approach online learning.

"The weight is off my shoulders", he said. Teachers and education leaders are finding their various ways to make sensible use of available education tools. In the future discussions about technology, learning and education will be less about technology and more about the coming changes in education materials and interactions.

Michael Shanks is professor of Archeology at Stanford University and a long-time participant in various Stanford centers and labs focused on design, digital media, and technology. Co-teaching a course in design history with David Kelley, founder of Stanford'sD.School, Mike keeps an ear close to the ground on matters relating technology to human interaction.

He has worked extensively with colleagues at the now closed Stanford Humanities Lab, and he travels frequently to Europe to work with city managers and companies who share his interest in urban development and design thinking. 

Mike has been part of our Future Learning network these past few years and we are incredibly fortunate to have him join us in Norway for the kind of big and small venue activities that we are planning. There will be ample time to hear a very good speaker, and also time to reflect together with an engaged colleague in smaller group settings.

At our 2015 summit on the beautiful Stanford campus, Mike gave a speech performance that is still talked about, and believe us when we say this: You will very seldom hear as much wisdom on the question of technology and human interaction as you will get from listening to Mike for one single hour. 

Keith Devlin is the Executive Director of H-Star Institute at Stanford University and a contributing member to the Future Learning Lab team, behind the Wold Learning Summit. We are heavily indebted top Keith for all his time spent with us and his generosity in opening up doors at Stanford University as well as in the Silicon Valley community that he is part of. 

In May 2015, Keith helped us launch a fantastic conference at Stanford, gathering education thought leaders from all over the country and some from as far away as Japan, the UK and the Nordic countries. In 2016 we will step up the activities in the Word Learning Summit together.

Author of numerous books, Keith is also the founding president of the company eed, where his mathematics background also finds an outlet in entrepreneurship creating video games in math. He has found several companies before that, He travels frequently, and he knows the Nordic Education Technology field like few others. He is also known on National Public Radio in the United States as the "Math Guy". At the 2016 summit, Keith till both be a keynote speaker and a co-director of several workshops.

Catherine Casserley is currently the VP of Learning Networks at EdCast in Mountain View, California. She is a former CEO of Creative Commons. She is an adviser to the Aspen Institute on matters relating to Education and Technology. She is adviser to the (US) National Science Foundation, as well. 

She is passionate about how openness and global knowledge sharing can promote learning. An early architect of the open educational resources (OER) field, she managed investments totaling more than $100M for the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Cathy spearheaded work in the areas of transparency and technology as Vice President of Innovation and Open Networks at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. She is a founding board member of the Digital Public Library of America and Peer-2-Peer University. Cathy earned her Ph.D. in the economics of education from Stanford University

Early in her career Cathy was a teacher of mathematics in Kingston, Jamaica. She earned her Ph.D. in the Economics of Education from Stanford University and holds a B.A. in Mathematics from Boston College. Cathy is a founding board member of the Digital Public Library of America and Peer-2-Peer University. Cathy is also a part of 2015 National Educational Technology Plan Face-to-Face Technical Working Group Meeting.