Alastair Creelman is an e-learning specialist at the Linnaeus University library in Kalmar. He is particularly interested in the opportunities that technology offers to open up education to all. He monitors developments and trends in educational technology and disseminates his findings through his blogs, Twitter and other social media as well as in published articles and conference contributions. He has taught in most areas of education (school, adult education, corporate training and university) and is today active in several national and international networks and organisations as well as Nordic and EU projects.

Maria Kvarnström works as educational developer at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. She has a background as Biomedical Laboratory Scientist and research in the medical field before working full time with education. Maria has an interest for online learning and how to manage the challenges for facilitating learners when locating education to an open online learning environment. Further she has a strong interest for PBL, started already when being a student at The Faculty of Health Sciences at Linköping University, and is very interested in investigating how to work with PBL online.

Jörg Pareigis is Head of the Centre for Teaching and Learning at Karlstad University, where he is also Assistant Professor in Business Administration and researcher at CTF, Service Research Center. In addition to his role as program manager of the International Business program, he leads the externally funded WISR16 and WISR17 course development projects. The purpose of the projects is to develop open online graduate courses for professionals in the private and public sector based on strategically important research centres at Karlstad University.

Lars Uhlin works as an Educational Developer at Karolinska Institutet and Linköping university as well as Mälardalen university. He has a background in Nursing and has long experience of Health Care Education and Problem-based learning (PBL). For the last 20 years he has worked with educational development in different settings both on the national and international arena. He is also coordinating a national/nordic network for PBL and is a member of steering group for the swedish network for Information Technology in Higher Education (ITHU). Some of Lars’ main focus areas are professional development and educational design within a framework of problem based-, interprofessional- and online learning.

Lotta Åbjörnsson works as an educational developer at the Division for Higher Education Development (AHU) at Lund University, Sweden. With a background in Physiotherapy and a Diploma in Physiotherapy Education she has worked as a teacher mainly in Physiotherapy programmes employing Problem Based Learning (PBL) as their method of instruction. Her keen interest in online learning and the digital world is of a rather recent date and it is with a fair bit of reluctance she has been able to convince herself of the usefulness and discover the inherent joys hiding in the nooks and crannies of digital tools and social media.

David Appel is an e-learning specialist at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences. He is responsible for the administration and development of the digital learning infrastructure and trains academic staff using education technology. He also provides support for the design, development and delivery of blended learning courses. A language teacher by training, he is fascinated by the opportunities of open education to broaden access to education and is particularly interested in developing the necessary digital literacies enabling participation.

Francisca Frenks works as an independent social entrepreneur at XWebinar.nl and 1OCEAN in the Netherlands and abroad. She has a background in innovative learning and closing the gap between learning and working. She also worked for more than ten years as an independent graphical designer. The last eight years Francisca focused on online collaborative learning and working. She works with all kinds of staff-members in organizations, in educational institutions, with marketing professionals, youngsters, elderly people and citizens to collaborate and learn online. Her challenge is to work effectively with a group online, where everyone is happy and motivated and feel free to participate, respecting everyone’s differences and feel the joy of diversity in the group. Francisca was a participant in both ONL152 and ONL161 as an Open Learner. She joined the team as co-facilitator on ONL162 and ONL181, and now returns as a facilitator for ONL192.

Lotta Fröjdfeldt is an academic developer at Mälardalen University (MDH), Eskilstuna, Sweden. She focuses on the pedagogical aspects of ICT in Higher Education. Lotta is experienced both as a system developer, 15 years, and as teacher, 7 years, and has worked with academic development since 2015. She is interested in, and is now studying for a masters degree in online teaching and learning in higher education. Lotta was a participant in ONL172, and is returning to facilitate again in ONL192.

Joanne Hart: A business background in Information Technology led to an interest in EdTech when I joined Varsity College as a lecturer in 2007. My current role as campus champion for technology-enabled learning allows me to explore and test the many EdTech offerings available. The primary focus of my role is to assist fellow lecturers in designing learning to incorporate EdTech in an active, blended environment. Despite my passion for technology it remains a goal to always be thoughtful in my approach to incorporating EdTech in lessons and to always remember ‘the human’!

Thashmee Karunaratne works at the Department of Computer and Systems Sciences, Stockholm University, as a project manager and a senior researcher. Her main research interests focus on learning analytics and mining educational data, specifically on how to use the log data in the e-learning systems as another dimension for student and course evaluations, mainly for online courses. Use of ICT for bridging communication gaps among Ph.D. students and how blended supervision models help supervisors for conducting efficient and quality supervision are among other topics. Thashmee holds a Ph.D. in machine learning and data mining and currently involved in teaching courses and supervising students in both classroom and online settings. In parallel with the work at the Center for teacher education and inspired by taking part in ONL171, Thashmee is privileged to be a co-facilitator in ONL191.

Filip Levälahti works as an e-learning coordinator at Arcada, University of applied sciences in Helsinki, Finland. His job is to support and develop the teachers’ competences in online and blended teaching and to coordinate the pedagogical infrastructure in the campus. Filip also teach a course in digital literacies for all new students at the university. He follows the expression “good online pedagogy begins with good pedagogy, period” (Paul Creasman) and is eager to find out how good pedagogy can be applied with modern technology.

Victoria Owen works as an Academic Support Manager at Varsity College (an educational brand of The Independent Institute of Education, the largest private provider of higher education in South Africa). Victoria works with a team of Teaching and Learning specialists across a national footprint of eight higher education campuses as they drive adoption of blended learning at Varsity College. Victoria has a background in teaching Economics to undergraduate students. Victoria has a specific interest in current trends in teaching and learning in online and blended environments.

Gizeh Perez Tenorio loves research and considers herself a passionate educator. For many years she has mentored students at Linköping University where she also practiced Problem Based Learning as part of the PhD program: “PBL, for me, was hard at the beginning but brought a lifelong reward at the end”. During ONL162 she discovered the power of PBL online and became fascinated by the course design and pedagogy. In the future she would like to understand more about what makes a successful collaboration in virtual teams, to design pedagogical material for digital courses and to learn MOOC design.

Diane Pilkinton-Pihko is a linguist, who is teaching English to non-native speakers at Aalto University in Finland. She did her graduate work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her post-graduate studies at the University of Helsinki (Finland). Her research interests include English as a lingua franca, recognition or prior learning, and content and language integrated learning. Her main work involves teaching oral and written communication to students in the fields of engineering or industrial arts. In recent years, developing and teaching courses as blended or online have become a central focus. She designed and taught her first fully online course in 2011, and since then has continued to develop herself and her courses for e-learning.

Alan Soong is an Associate Director (Learning Design and Research) at the Centre for Development of Teaching and Learning, National University of Singapore. He has been working in the area of academic development and the use of ICT for teaching and learning in higher education since 2002. Alan’s research interests include academic development and blended learning in higher education. He has also been actively serving as a member of the executive committee of the Australasian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (ASCILITE) since 2012. Alan participated in ONL171, and has since been a co-facilitator or facilitator.

Gregor Theilmeier is a trained anesthesiologist, translational researcher and passionate teacher. He has taught at various medical schools since 1995 and now holds a professorship at the University of Oldenburg in Germany, where he participates in the founding of a new medical school. He holds a cross appointment at the University Medical Center in Groningen. He started to teach PBL (offline) courses in the late 1990s at the medical school of the University of Münster. Ever since he has been engaged in and passionate about teaching PBL in medical contexts. He participated as a student in ONL181 and was so excited about online teaching and learning in the ONL format that he immediately returned to ONL191 to join in supporting the next generation of ONL enthusiasts as a co-facilitator. Returning to ONL192 as a facilitator.

Anne Whaits joined the executive team at Educor in May 2018 as Chief Academic Officer after having spent most of 2017 with Academic Partnerships – an American Online Programme Manager (OPM) Business in partnership with public universities in South Africa to take a portfolio of their degree programmes 100% online. Having facilitated several iterations of ONL before, Anne’ s current action research interests include new learning ecosystems with particular interest in developing online facilitation skills amongst academics and digital literacies amongst students. Educor has three distance education brands and five contact delivery brands across South Africa with the number of blended and online offerings growing.

Ana Maria Barral is an Associate Professor of Biology at National University in California. Her research focuses on microbes attached to ocean plastic, which she combines with a NSF-funded educational project to increase student engagement in STEM disciplines. She has been an early adopter of online technologies for science education, from flipped learning to the use of virtual lab activities. She was a participant in ONL191, which piqued her interest in open educational resources and the use of problem based learning in online environments. She is also passionate about equity and inclusiveness in education, particularly in STEM disciplines.

Mehwish Jabeen Bhatti is a medical doctor with paediatrics as speciality and Masters in Medical Education. I have a great deal of interest in online and distance education, course designing for virtual environment. Currently an entrepreneur running a non-profit organization dealing with online courses for both adults and children. At the same time a full time student at Södertorn University, Sweden.

Miriam Fischer works in the E-Learning Team of Zurich University of Applied Science Department of Social Work. She has a linguistic and paedagogical background.

Roseanne Jackson is currently an Educational Technologist at the Westville campus of Varsity College in South Africa. This role allows her to combine her love of teaching and learning with technology to produce students who are problem solvers and creative thinkers. Her background is in linguistics, psychology and education. She was a participant on the ONL 191 course earlier in the year and is looking forward to her new role as a co-facilitator in ONL192.

It is with great humility and pride that I introduce myself to all of you. I am Sinako Mxabo, an online Lecturer for Operations Management, Strategic Management, Introduction to Bookkeeping, Events Management as well as Public Relations Management. I have been an Academic Advisor for Educor since 2015. I studied Bachelor of Technology in Strategic Management in Transkei at Walter Sisulu University. I am currently busy with my PGD in Business Administration with University of KwaZulu Natal and my plan is to do my Master’s degree by 2020. I understand how vital it is becoming for individuals to expand their knowledge in order to successfully compete in our current economic times.

Lina Nilsson works as a lecturer in Public health at Mälardalen University in Västerås, Sweden. She mainly works with teaching public health in the nursing program. She is also very interested in digital pedagogy and participated in ONL181, and are looking forward to join ONL191 as a co-facilitator. Something not many know about Lina is that she doing pottery, she would be happy to sit at the potter’s wheel every night if it was possible.

Tore Nilsson is a senior lecturer in language education, Stockholm University. With a background in English linguistics he now works with foreign language teacher education, in-service training of language teachers and research in language education with a special interest in pre-service teacher cognition and professional devlopment. He has a keen interest in pedagogical development issues. In 2017 he co-ordinated a year-long project at his department with a focus on furthering digital literacy and the use of digital tools in language teacher education. During 2018 he is the pedagogical facilitator for the implementation of a new LMS at his department. Tore participated in ONL171, and has since been a co-facilitator or facilitator.

Hafizah Osman is a learning designer and she manages the eLearning team at the NUS School of Continuing and Lifelong Education (SCALE). She works closely with faculty members involved in Continuing Education to design and develop blended and online learning modules. She comes from media background, with over two decades of cross-platform, industry experience. She participated in ONL 191 and is looking forward to co-facilitate ONL 192.

Sandeep Patil received his PhD degree in computer science engineering from Luleå University of Technology, Luleå, Sweden. He is currently working as a post-doctoral researcher and as a teacher at the Dependable Communication and Computation Systems Group, Luleå University of Technology. He is currently looking how open networked learning eco-system can be used in his teaching to improve student participation, grades, and better time management. In a trial course this year, he is using a CC-NC-SA licensed course material.

Grant Penny works for IIE Varsity College as an Educational Technologist, he is responsible for the development of both online and face-to-face lecturers to achieve the organisations blended and technology-enhanced-learning goals. Key focus areas are in training lecturers to effectively utilise digital tools to enhance their classes, and how best to leverage the affordances of technology in education for different pedagogical practices. He graduated with an MA in Online and Distance Education from the Open University (UK).

Kiruthika Ragupathi is an academic developer with the Centre for Development of Teaching and Learning (CDTL) at the National University of Singapore (NUS). She has a background in Engineering and has worked with academic development since 1997. Her research interests are in analyzing pedagogical issues surrounding the integration of educational technologies into teaching and learning; understanding the learning processes and outcomes for learners engaged in technology-supported tasks; and in tracking and supporting learning in interactive learning environments. Her current research focuses on using student evaluation of teaching to enhance teaching practices and policies; in optimizing instructor interventions in online discussion forums to enhance the student learning experience; and also in studying the impact of gradeless learning on student motivation. Kiruthika took the ONL171 journey, and has since then been a co-facilitator or facilitator.

Mboni A. Ruzegea is a librarian at Muhimbili University of Health and Applied Sciences, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Danielle dos Santos is a pharmacist, Professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro Campus-Macaé, Brazil and currently working as a scientist at the University of Oldenburg, Germany. She has a background in public health and health related quality of life. She is involved in projects related to health education, outreach projects, health promotion and recently discovered her interest in online learning and network learning. She was an open learner in ONL181 and is still trying to find new ways to effectively include these new concepts in her daily work. Now she is very happy to participate in ONL 192 as a co-facilitator.

Annika Skogster works at Arcada, University of Applied Science in Helsinki, Finland as a lecturer in clinical care. She is a nurse and a paramedic and teaches nurses, midwives and paramedics in clinical topics and her big passion is medication administration and calculation. She participated in ONL181 and was so inspired by the course and the pedagogy in it that she joined as a co-facilitator for ONL191 and is returning for ONL192.

Clive Whaits is a senior lecturer in radio frequency and microwave electronics at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town, South Africa. He has been lecturing at undergraduate and graduate levels and is the cluster head of the electronic communication group in the department. He has been an educationist for the last 32 years and also spent 14 years in industry practising as an electronic engineer. He participated in the ONL191 course and fell in love with the world of open learning and sharing in this digital world. He is delighted to be back and involved as a co-facilitator for ONL192.

Alexandra Wirth  I work at the Careum Foundation, Department Educational Development and Kalaidos University of Applied Sciences Switzerland in Zurich, Department of Health Science. In Careum Educational Development I work as pedagogical researcher in the main areas of further development of curricula for problem-based learning (PBL) as well as teacher training PBL, interprofessionality and health literacy. At Kalaidos University I work as junior researcher in a EU project H2020 about mental health and wellbeing of adolescent young carers. I was an open learner in ONL 181 and was completely enthusiastic. And I am very happy to be a co-facilitator now.