Daithí Ó Murchú

Following on from his first PhD in Technology and linguistics, and subsequently in Elementary education, and eLearning, he was appointed as a cultural and technology expert with the European Union’s MyEurope schools, and as a distinguished member of AUCEi, CRELL, Learning to Learn, EU Expert Boards, and the 2nd. Forum for Learning. He also collaborated/collaborates with International universities on their blended-learning, and teacher training programmes. Seconded to MIC College of Education, University of Limerick as a lecturer in Methodology of teaching Gaelic, he continued to work with and further develop the Master programmes in MSc, MEd and MA in Education and ICT in the various universities. As a research fellow in ICT and Education at Trinity College, Dublin, he lectured and designed the first Gaelic, MSc programme modules in Knowledge management and ICT. Daithí’s innovative consultancy, lecturing and contractual work with Hibernia College, www.hiberniacollege.net over the past decade is renowned.
Deirdre Butler

Deirdre is Chair of the international advisory board for the second phase of Microsoft’s Partners in Learning initiative (MS-PIL 2008-2013). The primary focus of this advisory board is to provide ongoing feedback & input on the PiL initiative and a worldwide perspective on education for this ten-year, $500 million global initiative that supports educators’ use of technology in K-12 schools (link). She is also an advisor to the Innovative Teaching & Learning ITL Research which is a multiyear global research program designed to investigate the factors that promote the transformation of teaching practices & the impact those changes have on students’ learning outcomes across a broad range of country contexts (link). In addition, she is member of the Horizon K12 Advisory Board whose task is to manage the process of researching, discussing, and ultimately, selecting the topics for the annual Horizon Report: K-12 Edition which focuses on emerging technology and its applications to K-12 education. (link)
Building on these experiences Deirdre is currently engaged in a large scale project to support the development of Pre-service and In-Service Teacher Education in Kosovo (Dec 2011 – April 2014) introducing ICT as an instructional medium with a special focus on non-majority communities.
Michael Hallissy

Much of his work is focused on the creative use of ICTs in teaching and learning – particularly in using ICT in a constructivist manner. He is extremely interested in how technologies can improve student literacy, particularly their digital literacy. He is currently enrolled in the international EdD programme in the Institute of Education and he hope to conduct research in the area of digital literacy and computer games. He believes computer games provides a great opportunity to create new forms of learning, particularly for students who are not engaged by traditional methods and approaches.