Innovation and Research Commercialisation Conference

Dr. Bethany Simunich is the Director of Research and Innovation at Quality Matters (QM), an international non-profit dedicated to quality online learning at all levels of education. In this role, Dr. Simunich leads efforts to help institutions, faculty, and staff make data-driven, research-based decisions to implement online quality assurance and promote online student success. In her twenty years in higher education, she has held faculty roles for both in-person and online teaching and also worked in educational technology, instructional design, and faculty development for online learning. As an online learning administrator, Dr. Simunich has both created and managed processes and teams for online instructional design and faculty development for online teaching. As an online learning researcher, her focus includes the creation and implementation of online quality assurance processes, presence in the online classroom, online student and instructor self-efficacy and satisfaction, and learning achievement in online courses. Dr. Simunich earned her doctoral degree from The Ohio State University and two Master’s degrees from the University of Pittsburgh.

Dr. Bethany Simunich is the Director of Research and Innovation at Quality Matters (QM), an international non-profit dedicated to quality online learning at all levels of education. In this role, Dr. Simunich leads efforts to help institutions, faculty, and staff make data-driven, research-based decisions to implement online quality assurance and promote online student success. In her twenty years in higher education, she has held faculty roles for both in-person and online teaching and also worked in educational technology, instructional design, and faculty development for online learning. As an online learning administrator, Dr. Simunich has both created and managed processes and teams for online instructional design and faculty development for online teaching. As an online learning researcher, her focus includes the creation and implementation of online quality assurance processes, presence in the online classroom, online student and instructor self-efficacy and satisfaction, and learning achievement in online courses. Dr. Simunich earned her doctoral degree from The Ohio State University and two Master’s degrees from the University of Pittsburgh.

Dr. Girija has taught in the higher education sector for over 20 years. She joined Republic Polytechnic in 2004 after having spent over a decade in the university sector at the faculty of Dentistry of the prestigious National University of Singapore (NUS) and the SRM University, Chennai, in India.

Girija’s contribution to STEM education includes developing inquiry learning programmes in Science, integrating digitalisation tools into education to promote deep learning and creating competency standards for faculty development. She led the team in RP to develop multimedia digital content (eLearning) for a nationwide learning portal for all polytechnics. Girija also serves in the joint polytechnic committee and chairs projects in the areas of Professional Development for Teaching and Learning and ICT enhanced teaching and learning. She had steered the teaching fraternity to pivot to online teaching during the COVID-19 and formulated institutional level policies to address the challenges and restrictions posed due to COVID.

She is passionate and committed to the development of STEM educators to make a difference in students’ life through authentic and deep learning approaches. Her passion is demonstrated by her desire to constantly improve herself through lifelong learning.

Girija was a recipient of the outstanding facilitator award in Republic Polytechnic and is also an accomplished curriculum designer. For her devotion to education and contributions to RP, Girija was conferred the National Day Award 2018 Public Medal Administration (Bronze).

Dr. Rabab holds a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the Arabian Gulf University, Bahrain and her Master’s in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Sultanate of Oman. She has extensive academic experience in Biochemistry and nutrition and has developed practical experience in proteomics through the on-going PhD project. She is the representative of College of Health and Sports Sciences at the UoB Academic committee. Aside from lecturing, she is also the Head of the College’s Quality committee and the Curriculum Committee

She is actively involved in curriculum reviews at CHSS. She is a pioneer in using e-learning and course management systems in teaching. She is an active member in quality and research committee. She has served as a track chair and technical program committees in e-learning conferences at UOB. She has published papers in journals and conference proceedings.

Dr. Diana Aljahromi is the Director of the Unit for Teaching Excellence and Leadership and is an assistant professor of Linguistics. She previously held the post of the Director of Quality Assurance and Accreditation Office at the University of Bahrain. She is a specialist in faculty development, e-learning and quality assurance. She has a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Sheffield, UK (2012); a Postgraduate Diploma in Academic Practice (PCAP) 2015, an MA in Applied English Language Studies (Honors) (2003) from the University of Bahrain, and a BA in English Language and Literature (Honors) (1995) from the University of Bahrain. She is also a fellow of the UK’s HEA. Dr. Diana has received a number of awards (Most Distinguished Teacher, 2003; Bahrain e-Content Award, 2005). She is the country director and representative of a number of international Higher Education organisations such as HETL, World Englishes, EMI, Tera Nova, and others. Her primary research interests focus on assessment, instructional technologies, e-learning, faculty professional development, and quality assurance in addition to linguistics, discourse analysis, sociolinguistics, computational linguistics, corpus linguistics, and second language acquisition. She has many publications in this regard, many of which are published on Scopus.

Dr. Abdul Razzak currently works as an Academic Consultant in the Directorate of Higher Education Reviews at the Bahrain Education and Training Quality Authority (the BQA). Prior to this, she held different teaching and administrative positions at the Bahrain Teachers College of the University of Bahrain and also at Mohammad Almana College of Health Sciences in Khobar, KSA and Effat University in Jeddah, KSA.
She holds a PhD by Published Works from Kingston University, London-UK and a PhD in Educational Technology from Walden University in Minnesota, USA. She has several years of experience with the Saudi NCAAA serving as a Panel Chair of Accreditation Teams reviewing university programs.
Dr. Abdul Razzak has several publications in international scientific journals and her research interests include technology integration in education, effective educational leadership, professional development, and good pedagogical practices in education. She is also a reviewer on several international scientific journals in addition to being the founder and managing editor of her own international peer-reviewed scientific journal ‘The Journal of Teaching and Teacher Education’.

Dr. Christine is an Associate of Advance HE, handling several projects along the lines of quality enhancements in higher education, educational leadership, curricular change and development and the like. She has an impressive array of achievements under her belt. She was an Associate Professor in the Quality Assurance and Enhancement team of University of Suffolk, UK for close to 9 years. Prior to that, whe was the Director for Open Learning at the University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. She was the Head of Academic Practice at the University of Salford, UK for 2 years. Prior to that was a stint as a Lecturer in Educational Research at Lancaster University, UK for 17 years. She obtained her PhD in Networked Learning from Lancaster University. Her work allows her to lead on strategic development of open, online and distance learning as she supports the development of quality enhancements, with a particular emphasis on effective learning, teaching and assessment. She works across AHE partner institutions to promote new and innovative approaches to teaching and learning, for example through staff development events, team consultancy, bespoke activities and engaging in pedagogic research. Christine is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and is involved with a number of other professional bodies and interest groups including the Staff and Educational Development Association; Heads of Educational Development Group; UK Society for Research in Higher Education; and the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction. Christine's research interests and associated publications have concerned the design and development of open, distance and flexible learning environments, particularly using learning technologies and social media for continuing professional development. Her PhD was on networked learning: continuing professional development and the creation and use of multimedia artefacts. She has interests in exploring conceptions of student engagement, learning transition and evolving academic identity within HE, especially from a community of practice theoretical perspective. She also seeks to promote understanding around and application of creativity in teaching and learning. A new area of research and focus for academic development is looking at the intersections between digital fluency and teaching excellence, within the HE context.

Kate Lister is the Head of Academic Professional Development at Arden University, and is a researcher in accessibility and inclusion at the Open University, UK. She has been an associate at Advance HE for almost three years, most recently working on major AHE collaborative projects around EDI and mental wellbeing in the curriculum. Her Doctorate in Education focuses on mental wellbeing in distance learning: barriers, enablers and solutions which she obtained from The Open University. She also obtained her Master's degree on Online and Distance Learning from the same institution. She is a Principal Fellow of the AHE. Kate’s passion and expertise centre around inclusion; particularly inclusive pedagogies, accessibility, equity, and mental wellbeing in technology-enhanced learning. She is passionate about student voice and equitable participation, and about the transformative power of education for social justice. Her research aligns primarily to the transformative, or critical, educational research paradigm, in that it attempts to not only identify disparities in equity, but to address them in practice. She has led or co-led research projects relating to EDI, inclusive language, student mental wellbeing, administrative burden for disabled students, identifying accessibility practices and perceptions in academic staff, effective inclusive practice in distance learning, and supporting students to reflect on and represent their experiences as a journey. These have involved artificial intelligence, participatory design, narrative inquiry, and other qualitative and quantitative methods. She is currently the principal investigator on the Office for Students-funded project Positive Digital Practices at Arden University, working with three HEIs and three sector bodies to scale up positive practices for mental wellbeing for part-time, distance and commuter students.