Conference 2017 Keynote Speakers

Dr. Anne Looney is currently the Interim CEO at the Higher Education Authority in Dublin and in Spring 2017 will become the founding Executive Dean of Dublin City University’s new Institute of Education. From 2001 until 2016 she was the CEO of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, the agency responsible for curriculum and assessment for early years, primary and post-primary education in Ireland. A former teacher, she completed her doctoral studies at the Institute of Education in University College London. In 2014/2015 she was Professorial Research Fellow at the Learning Science Institute Australia, based at Australian Catholic University in Brisbane.

Her research interests include assessment policy and practice, curriculum, initial teacher education and professional standards for teachers and teaching. She has also published on religious, moral and civic education, and education policy.

She tweets at @annelooney

Brendan Tangney is a Professor in Computer Science in  Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin and a Fellow of Trinity College.  He is co-director of Trinity’s Centre for Research in IT in Education (a joint initiative between the School of Education and  the School of Computer Science & Statistics) and has held visiting positions in the Universities of Sydney and Kyoto.  He is a  member of the Editorial Boards of  Computers & Education and the AACE Journal of Computers in Mathematics &  Science Teaching.

Brendan has published widely in the field of Technology Enhanced Learning on topics including teaching coding, teacher professional development,  mobile learning and 21^st century teaching & learning. He was instrumental in setting up and directing Trinity’s Masters in Technology and Learning, for which he served as course director for many years. More recently he was instrumental in the creation of Trinity’s innovative postgraduate certificate in 21^st Century Teaching & Learning.

He is academic director of Trinity’s Bridge21 project,  a major design based research project which is looking at how technology can be used to support a 21^st century approach to teaching and learning in Irish classrooms.  Since 2007 Bridge21 has run workshops for over 12,000 students and 1,000 teachers.  The Trinity Access21 project is a major Google funded partnership with Trinity’s outreach unit (the Trinity Access Programmes) which is looking at how the Bridge21 model can be used in schools to support progression to higher education, particularly in areas with traditionally low progression rates, by strengthening the key skills of students through a range of innovative practices and supports with a particular emphasis on computer coding.