12TH WIEF GLOBAL DISCOURSE – DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AND THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION
As the world enters into the second year of living with the COVID-19, half of the global student population is still affected by full or partial school closures. It has created the most severe global education disruption in history. At the peak of the crisis, UNESCO data showed that over 1.6 billion learners in more than 190 countries were affected.
As a result, educational institutes had to hastily turn to e-learning, where teaching is undertaken remotely and on digital platforms. It become a catalyst for governments worldwide to transform their education system into online teaching.
Even before COVID-19, there has been high adoption of education technology, with global edtech investments reaching US$18.66 billion in 2019 and the overall market for online education forecasted to reach US$350 billion by 2025. Due to the pandemic, there has been a significant surge in the use of innovative technological solutions powered by artificial intelligence providing improved opportunities for student interaction and collaboration, support interactive digital classrooms and easily adopted by students and educators alike.
Prioritising education recovery is crucial to order to build more resilient and inclusive education systems whilst at the same time avoiding a generational catastrophe. School closures also threaten progress made towards gender equality, and also cut access to vital services for protection, nutrition, health and well-being.
This Programme will explore:
- Lessons learnt, risks facing education and how technology has impacted the global education market.
- New trends, opportunities and challenges for policymakers, educational institutions and other stakeholders to harness technology to improve and transform education system.
- The need to counter existing learning gaps as well as inequalities and the risk of increased dropout.
- Partnerships between educational institutions, technology and media organisations.
Associate Professor Ts Dr Muhammad Helmi Norman
Deputy Director of Instructional Technologies
Centre for Teaching and Curriculum Development
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)
Malaysia
Dr Muhammad Helmi Norman is Deputy Director of Instructional Technologies at the Center for Teaching and Curriculum Development, and an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Educationm Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. He drives the e-learning transformation at the university. His expertise is in digital and futuristic education.
Being an Apple Distinguished Educator, he is involved in educational transformations at all levels. He is an influencer of digital and futuristic education across Europe and Asia. He has given keynote addresses, talks and workshops in this field. He is a certified Professional Technologist of the Malaysian Board of Technologists.
Dr Helmi’s global experience includes his appointment on the board of directors of the International Association for Blended Learning and has been attached to global research institutions such as Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience at University of California, Bournemouth University in the United Kingdom and Center for Driven Innovation, Learning and Design, Aalborg University in Denmark.
Dr Tsinakos Avgoustos
Professor and Director
Advanced Educational Technologies and Mobile Applications (AETMA) Lab
International Hellenic University
Greece
Dr Tsinakos Avgoustos is a Professor and Director of Advanced Educational Technologies and Mobile Applications (AETMA) Lab as well as Immersive Technologies in Education Training and Game Design MSc Programme, in the Department of Computer Science at the International Hellenic University in Greece.
Dr Tsinakos collaborates with several open universities in Canada, Spain, Netherlands, Japan and China, being also the coordinator as well as a member of the coordination team in more than 29 national as well as international projects on the topic of distance education and technology-enhanced learning.
In addition, Dr Tsinakos has participated in more than 60 international and national conferences as an invited speaker. His publication list includes four books in English and one in Chinese, five book chapters, more than 75 papers on the topic of e-learning, presenter learning and AI.
MODERATOR
Azlina Kamal
UNICEF Education Specialist
Malaysia
Azlina Kamal is the Education Specialist for UNICEF in Malaysia. She leads the education section and provides technical guidance for the strategic development, implementation and evaluation of education programmes within the country programme. Besides focusing on improving learning outcomes, her work revolves around ensuring equity and inclusion especially for children who are marginalised, disadvantaged as well as excluded.
Azlina is interested in the development of politically and socially contextualised approaches to educational leadership, social justice and policy development and engagement. She graduated from University of Kent and UCL Institute of Education, London specialising in education leadership and management and was a recipient of British Chevening Award.