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Keynote Speakers

Blackboard is pleased to announce our Keynote Speakers for BbWorld Europe '09.

Monday, 6 April, 5:00 PM
Blackboard Corporate Keynote
Michael Chasen, President & Chief Executive Officer

Tuesday, 7 April, 9:00 AM
The Future of Higher Education : Innovate or Evaporate
Dirk Van Damme, Head of CERI - OECD/EDU

Higher education institutions (HEI's) are operating under very different circumstances than a few decades ago, when leaders of contemporary societies have been educated. Demographic, economic, social and cultural transformations are affecting the environment in which institutions are functioning. In the first part of the keynote lecture, a brief overview will be presented of the main trends affecting HEI's, drawing upon recent OECD data. Demographic transformations, internationalization, the need for expanded and more equitable access and the demand for increased investments in human capital will stimulate further expansion of higher education. At the same time HEI's will have to turn away from the pitfalls of massification, by developing tailor-made educational servicies tuned to the needs of contemporary learners. Diversification of provision to an ever more heterogenous student population will lead to the development of very different institutional arrangements for learning and knowledge creation. Technology certainly will provide some of the answers to these needs, but may also further stimulate diversification. A short overview of the available evidence on technology-driven innovation in higher education will help to clarify this point. Finally, some possible scenario's for the future of higher education will be presented. Some of them are perhaps not particularly reassuring for present-day's institutions, as they will have it increasingly difficult to defend their quasi-monopoly on high-skills development in knowledge societies. The conclusion is evident: HEI's need to make strategic choices for radical innovation if they want to uphold their status as the most powerful and responsive institutional teaching and learning arrangements for future human capital development.

Dirk Van Damme currently is Head of CERI (Centre for Education Research and Innovation) at OECD in Paris. He holds a PhD degree in educational sciences from Ghent University and is also professor of educational sciences in the same university (since 1995). He also was part-time professor in comparative education at the Free University of Brussels (1997-2000) and visiting professor of comparative education at Seton Hall University, NJ, USA (2001-2008).

He has been professionally involved in educational policy development as deputy director of the cabinet of the Flemish Minister of education Luc Van den Bossche (1992-1998), as general director of the Flemish rectors' conference VLIR (2000-2003), as expert for the implementation of the Bologna Declaration for Ms Marleen Vanderpoorten, Flemish Minister of education (2002-2003) and as director of the cabinet of Mr Frank Vandenbroucke, Flemish minister of education (2004-2008). In 2004 he served also as executive director of the RAGO, the organization of public schools in the Flemish Community of Belgium.

He has served as an expert on issues related to international higher education policy, quality assurance and accreditation for several international organisations, as board member of QANU, the quality assurance agency for the Dutch universities, as member of the scientific board of AQA, the Austrian Quality Agency in higher education, and as member of the Committee for the evaluation of the University of Luxembourg.

Wednesday, 8 April, 9:00 AM
Step Change: Re-Engineering or Re-Invention?

Gordon Freedman, Vice President Education Strategy, Blackboard

The current economic downturn has created an unexpected outcome. Instead of simply looking at how to contain costs, institutions and governments are also looking at how education needs to evolve to fit into the information age. This dual focus of cost containment and future visioning is changing the technology discussion. As short as a year ago, technology?s benefits were still being debated. Today, with the necessity of meeting the needs of both students and society, it is understood that technology will play both a short-term and long-term role in creating modern education cultures. The idea that a step-change must occur in higher education is implicit, but how will it work? Three levels of change that include both re-engineering and re-invention process will be discussed based on conversations with education and government leadership in multiple countries.

Gordon Freedman, Blackboard's Vice President Education Strategy, is part of the launch of the Blackboard Institute, an effort by the company to provide a continual dialogue and emphasis on education change world-wide. Gordon has produced a series of white papers (see www.blackboard.com/research) and is currently working on expanding his Bb World talk into a major paper that will include collaborative input from education and government leadership in the United States and the EU.