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Format: Panel Discussion

Description: Education offers incredible potential for the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies, with several significant opportunities — and challenges — that the introduction of artificial intelligence could bring, especially to higher education. Increasingly, higher education institutions, as well as adult and professional learning are being transformed by intelligent systems that are helping humans learn better and achieve their learning objectives. The breadth of areas in which AI is already inserted in education includes intelligent tutors or chatbots, personalized learning, smart teaching, learning analytics, reducing student drop-off, education administration, data privacy and ethics. This webinar will explore research and experiences of introducing, at different levels, AI in education, and looks at what the future might mean for teachers, students and institutions.

Presenters: 

• Tony Bates, EDEN Senior Fellow

Tony Bates is President and CEO of Tony Bates Associates Ltd, a private company specializing in consultancy and training in the planning and management of e-learning and distance education. He is also Distinguished Visiting Professor in the G. Raymond Chang School of Continuing Education, Ryerson University, Toronto and a Research Associate at Contact North, Ontario.

• Olaf Zawacki-Richter, University of Oldenburg, Senior EDEN Fellow

Olaf Zawacki-Richter is professor of educational technology at the University of Oldenburg (Germany), Faculty of Education and Social Sciences. He is Associate Editor of the journal “Distance Education” and a member of the editorial board of the “International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning” (IRRODL), “Open Learning” and the “The Journal for Higher Education Development”. Olaf has authored over 150 publications and served as invited keynote speaker, chair and reviewer at many international conferences. A systematic review of research on AI in higher education is forthcoming in the International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education (ETHE). Professor Zawacki-Richter is the founding Director of the Center for Open Education Research (COER) and the Director of the Center for Lifelong Learning (C3L) at Oldenburg University. 

• Cristobal Cobo, Oxford Internet Institute

Cristóbal Cobo is a Senior Education Specialist at the World Bank. Before joining the World Bank in 2019, where he is a core member of the World Bank’s global edtech team, Dr Cobo spent 15 years working at the intersection of future of learning, cultures of innovation and human-centred technologies across both developed and developing countries. From 2014-2019, Dr Cobo served as founding Director of the Center for Research at the Ceibal Foundation in Uruguay, leading initiatives to learn from one of the world’s most notable examples of the use of educational technologies at scale across an entire education system, Plan Ceibal. Before joining the Center for Research at the Ceibal Foundation, Cristóbal spent five years as an associate researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford (UK).

• Alexandra I. Cristea, Durham University

Alexandra I. Cristea is Professor, Head of the Innovative Computing research group at the Computer Science Department, Durham University. Her research includes web science, learning analytics, user modelling and personalisation, semantic web, social web, authoring, with over 250 papers on these subjects (over 3700 citations on Google Scholar, h-index 31). Especially, her work on frameworks for adaptive systems has influenced many researchers and is highly cited (with the top paper with over 180 citations and growing). She is within the top 50 researchers in the world in the area of educational computer-based research according to Microsoft Research. Prof. Cristea has been highly active and has an influential role in international research projects. She is experienced in running research projects and has led various projects – Newton funded workshop on Higher Education for All (’14-’18), Santander funded Education for disadvantaged pupils (’14-18′), Warwick-funded project APLIC (’11-;12), EU Minerva projects ALS (06-09) and EU Minerva ADAPT (’02-’05); as well as participated as university PI in several EU FP7 projects – BLOGFOREVER (’11-’13), GRAPPLE (’08- ’11), PROLEARN (’07) and as co-PI in the Warwick-funded Engaging Young People with Assistance Technologies (’13-’15) also featured by the BBC. Recently she has taken giving back to the community to a different level, with the project TechUP (2019-2020) training 100 women in computer science from various (BAME) backgrounds.