Keynote speakers
Prof Asha Singh Kanwar Professor Asha Singh Kanwar, one of the world’s leading advocates of learning for development, is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) since 2012. Before joining COL, Professor Kanwar was a consultant in open and distance learning at UNESCO's Regional Office for Education in Africa. |
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Dr Tony Bates Distinguished Visiting Professor The G.Raymond chang School of Continuing Education Ryerson University Vancouver, Canada Dr Tony Bates is a distinguished visiting professor at the Chang School of Continuing Education at Ryerson University in Canada and a distinguished visiting scholar at the De Groote School of Business at Canada’s McMaster University. He is also a research associate at Contact North. He has almost 50 years’ experience using technology for teaching. He started at the British Open University in 1969, where he became a full professor in educational media research. In 1989, he emigrated to Canada to assume the position of Executive Director: Strategic Planning and Information Technology at the Open Learning Agency in Vancouver. In 1995, he became Director of Distance Education and Technology at the University of British Columbia. Upon his retirement in 2003, he started his own consulting company that specialises in the planning and management of learning technologies in tertiary education. He has consulted in over 40 countries and has received honorary degrees from six universities for his research in distance education.
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Professor Ashom Musa Maisamari Professor Ashom Musa Maisamari started his career as a teacher with the Bauchi State Government. After obtaining his doctoral degree in English Education from the University of Jos, he quickly rose to the rank of Education Officer II before joining the University of Abuja. He has held several positions, including state coordinator on the Joint Consultative Committee on Education and National Council on Education, and social mobilisation officer at Mass Mobilisation for Social Justice and Economic Recovery. He was also chairperson of the Governing Council Tatari Ali Polytechnic Bauchi, director of the General Bauchi State Agency for Youth and Women Empowerment, Rehabilitation and Development, executive chairperson of the Bauchi State Commission for Youth and Women Empowerment, Rehabilitation and Development, and chairperson of the Bauchi State Committee for the Disarticulation of Junior Secondary Schools from Senior Secondary Schools. He was on the board of Nigerian Inland Waterways and a member of the Visitation Panels to Federal Polytechnic Nwanna, Afigbo and Federal Polytechnic Bida. He has also held a number of high-ranking positions at various academic institutions and currently serves as Dean of the Faculty of Education at the University of Abuja.
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Professor Laban Peter Ayiro
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Ms Sangster Jere Ms Sangster M Jere has been Principal of the Technical and Vocational Teachers’ College (TVTC) in Luanshya, Zambia, since 2014/15. She started her career as an educationist in 1980. She was head of TVTC’s departments of Research and Consultancy and Education before being appointed as a training manager in 2006. She holds a master’s degree in Business Administration from Maastricht School of Management in The Netherlands and a master’s degree in Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) from Bolton University in the United Kingdom. She is currently pursuing her doctoral degree at the University of Africa in Zambia. She is a strategist, who is fuelled by compassion, goal orientation and dissatisfaction with the status quo. At TVTC, Ms Jere has developed new policies, increased national recognition, developed new organisational structures for effective management and expanded the programmes from the initial four diploma programmes to 12 diploma and degree programmes. She has also increased the focus on staff development, advocated for the uptake of technology-enabled teaching and learning and improved learning outcomes. She serves on the Commonwealth Association of Technical Universities and Polytechnics Board as Regional Gender Focal Point Person for Central and Southern Region. |
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Professor Mudasiru Olalere Yusuf Professor Mudasiru Olalere Yusuf obtained a BA(Ed) degree from the University of Ife (now the Obafemi Awolowo University) in 1987, an MA(Ed) degree in Educational Technology from Obafemi Awolowo University in 1991 and a PhD in Educational Technology from the University of Ilorin in 1997. He started his career as an auxiliary teacher at Apoti Community Grammar School in 1982, after which he was appointed as an assistant lecturer in the Department of Curriculum Studies and Educational Technology of the University of Ilorin in 1992. He was appointed as a lecturer in the Department in 1994 and as a senior lecturer in 1998. He was appointed as a reader in the Department of Science Education at the University of Ilorin. He is currently a professor in the Department and has fulfilled 34 administrative roles during his career at the University. He is a member of eight professional bodies. He has published many journal articles, book chapters, conference papers and workshop presentations and has supervised 15 master’s degree students and 19 doctoral degree candidates.
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Pofessor Dikeledi Mahlo Professor Dikeledi Mahlo holds a PhD degree in Inclusive Education. She is an associate professor in the Department of Inclusive Education at the University of South Africa (Unisa). Prior to joining academia, she was a Foundation Phase teacher in the Mpumalanga Department of Education and an inclusive education specialist at the Gauteng Department of Education. She offers modules in inclusive education at undergraduate and postgraduate level and has supervised eight master’s degree students and two doctoral degree candidates. In 2015, she was a recipient of Unisa’s Developing Researcher Women’s Award. She has authored six chapters in scholarly book and is currently co-editing a book on autism from an African perspective. She has published articles in various local and international accredited journals.
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Professor Freda Wolfenden Prof Freda Wolfenden is a professor of Education and International Development at the Open University in the UK, where she has held a number of management positions, including Associate Dean for the Faculty of Education and Language Studies. Since joining The Open University in 2004, she has directed various teacher education programmes, including teachandlearn.net, an innovative online professional development initiative, and the Master’s in Education degree programme. From 2008 to 2012, Prof Wolfenden was the Director of the Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (TESSA) programme. More recently, she was the Academic Director for TESS-India, a large-scale open educational resource (OER) teacher education initiative working across seven Indian states to reach up to a million teachers. She also led The Open University component of the Girls’ Education Challenge Project in Sierra Leone. Prof Wolfenden leads many research activities in Sub-Saharan Africa and India that focus on teacher education and how digital technologies can influence pedagogic practices and support sustainable transformation at institutional and system level. Most recently, she contributed to work on reconceptualising the education workforce for the Education Commission and explored the characteristics of teachers working with marginalised students for the Varkey Foundation. |