Dr. Linda Amrane-Cooper

Director, Centre For Online And Distance Education, University Of London

Dr Linda Amrane-Cooper, PFHEA is Director of Academic Practice in Online and Distance Education at the University of London, where she also leads the Centre for Online and Distance Education (CODE). Her distinguished career spans Higher Education, teacher development, and Museum Education, reflecting a lifelong commitment to transformative learning. A member of the University of London’s Senior Management Group, Dr Amrane-Cooper is a recognised leader in online and distance education. She works across the University of London Federation, nationally and internationally, to advance inclusive, accessible, and high- quality digital, blended, distance, and transnational education. With extensive experience in diverse global contexts, Dr Amrane-Cooper is driven by a deep passion for empowering learners and educators. Her previous leadership roles include serving as Dean, International Lead, Head of Campus, and Head of Initial Teacher Education. She also co-designed and led the University of London’s Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education for seven years. At CODE, Dr Amrane-Cooper fosters a vibrant community of over 40 Fellows - leading voices in educational thought and practice. Her dual leadership roles ensure that innovation, capacity building, quality assurance and research are embedded in the University’s strategic direction. She also plays a pivotal role in shaping institutional policy, particularly in the areas of Artificial Intelligence and assessment. As an active researcher, Dr Amrane-Cooper’s scholarly work focuses on assessment in online environments, AI in higher education, educator development, and inclusive practice in digital and distance learning. Her teaching experience spans all educational levels—from early years to doctoral supervision—across disciplines including social sciences, teacher education, mathematics, business, physics, and science. She also serves as a peer reviewer for two academic journals.

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Prof. Madhu Parhar

Former Director, Center For Online Learning, IGNOU, New Delhi

https://www.linkedin.com/in/madhu-parhar-73083889/?originalSubdomain=in

Dr. G. Mythili

Additional Director, Stride, IGNOU, New Delhi

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mythili-g-480a1359/?trk=public_post_comment_actor-name&originalSubdomain=in

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Prof. N.K. Chadha

Former Professor Of Psychology University Of Delhi

https://www.du.ac.in/du/uploads/departments/faculty_members/Psychology/2443.pdf

Prof. V.V. Subrahamanyam

Professor Of Computer Science, Socis, Ignou, New Delhi

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=T7QOLGcAAAAJ&hl=en

Prof. S.S. Rawat

Director, Socis, IGNOU, New Delhi

https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandeeprawat2020/?originalSubdomain=in

Dr Rajiv Ranjan Singh

Lecturer, Dept Of Engineering, School Of Science And Engineering, Glasgow Caledonian University, Uk

Dr Rajiv Ranjan Singh is a Lecturer in the Department of Computer Science at Glasgow Caledonian University. Before joining Glasgow Caledonian, he worked as an Associate Professor in Computer Science at Shyam Lal College (Evening) at the University of Delhi in India. He has acquired both a master's degree and a PhD in Cyber Security from the University of Birmingham. He obtained his master's in Computer Security as a sponsored candidate from the University of Delhi after getting selected under a Faculty Training Programme. Subsequently, he was awarded a fully-funded PhD studentship by the School of Computer Science at the University of Birmingham. During his PhD, under the supervision of Dr Tom Chothia, he worked on formalising the stealthiness of attacks on security protocols. They also developed a novel and economical methodology of improving security protocol specifications by modelling just the attacks and not the complete protocol

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Prof. Santosh Panda

Former Director, STRIDE, IGNOU and Former Chairperson, NCTE

Prof Santosh Panda retired as Director of the Staff Training & Research Institute of Distance Education (STRIDE) and the Malviya Mission Teacher Training Centre(MMTTC) at the Indira Gandhi National Open University. A graduate in Economics and master’s in Education, he has a PhD in Education (Kurukshetra), Fulbright Post-Doctoral (UNM/ USA), Certificate in Education TV (BBC/ UK), and Certificate in Online Teaching (Maryland/ USA). Dr Panda started university teaching in 1984, and has above 40 years of experience in teaching, research and administration. In the past, he has been: Chairperson, National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), Government of India; Director, Policy & Research, Association of Indian Universities (AIU); Director, Centre for Flexible Learning, The University of the South Pacific, Fiji; and Founding Director, Inter-University Consortium for ICT, IGNOU. An internationally recognised leader of ODL from the Global South, he has presented keynotes and workshops in over 30 countries; presented convocation address in three universities; and has been consultant for ADB, COL, DfID/BC, Ford Foundation, GTZ, IDRC, SADC, UNDP, UNESCO, and the World Bank. He has been visiting professor at: Manchester Metropolitan University/UK, University of London/UK, Beijing Normal University/China, University of Maryland University College/USA (& University of Oldenburg/Germany), UNISA/South Africa, and University of Guadalajara/Mexico. He is a member of UNESCO international awards committee of the Indian National Commission for UNESCO/ Ministry of Education, Government of India; member of the Yoga Certification Board-TC, Ministry of AYUSH, Government of India; Mentor, National Child Rights Research Fellowship Committee, Child Rights & You (CRY); Mentor, ODL Practitioner Research Training & Mentorship Initiative, COL, Canada. He has been programme director for long-term training of Indian bureaucrats on ODL, sponsored by the DOPT/ GoI and UNDP; and programme director for training of 1.5 million university and college teachers on NEP-2020 at IGNOU under the Ministry of Education & University Grants Commission. He specialises and publishes in areas of: Distance, Online and Blended Learning; Teacher Education and Staff Development; Higher Education Policy, Costing and Quality, and Curriculum, Pedagogy and Technology; Open Schooling and Open Vocational Education; Open Educational Resources and Open Educational Practices; and Programme Evaluation. His recent books include: Case Studies on Blended Learning in Higher Education (2024/ Springer); Pedagogy in Practice (2022/ Bloomsbury); Technology Enabled Learning (2021/ COL); Planning & Management in Distance Education (2017/ Routledge, also translated into Chinese by UNESCO); Economics of Distance and Online Learning (2008/ Routledge). He is the Chief Editor of Scopus-indexed Journal of Learning for Development, published by the Commonwealth of Learning/ Canada. He has guided above 19 masters’ dissertations, 5 MPhil dissertations and 9 PhD theses; and conducted international research projects funded by BC/ UK, IDRC-CRDI/ Canada, COL/Canada, GTZ/Germany. He sat in the editorial board of above 15 refereed journals, mostly published by Routledge. Recent/Forthcoming Publications: Panda, S. (2025). Globalization, liberalization and technology in higher education. In P. K. Misra & N. Sabharwal (eds.), India higher education report 2024 - Technology and higher education. Routledge (forthcoming). Mishra, S. & Panda, S. (Eds.) (2025). Handbook of open universities around the world. New York: Routledge (forthcoming). https://www.routledge.com/Handbook-of-Open-Universities-Around-the-World/Mishra-Panda/p/book/9781032754055 Misra, P., Mishra, S. & Panda, S. (Eds.) (2025). Case studies on blended learning in higher education: Design, development and delivery. Springer. (forthcoming) https://link.springer.com/book/9789819607211 Panda, S. (2024).University and teacher education. In P. Panda (Ed.), Teacher education landscapes in India: Governance and quality management (pp 29-55). Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003489245-3/university-teacher-education-santosh-panda?context=ubx&refId=ce02e1fa-c8a5-48a5-a8ea-41e8c86c5b03 Mustafa, M. Y., …Panda, S, …(2024).A systematic review of literature reviews on Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED): A road map to a future research agenda. Smart Learning Environments, 11(59). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40561-024-00350-5 Panda, S., Mishra, S. & Misra, P. (Eds.) (2024). Case studies on blended learning in higher education: Policy, planning, and quality assurance. Springer https://link.springer.com/book/9789819793877 Panda, S. (2024). Cost analysis and return on investment for blended learning. In S. Panda, S. Mishra. & P.K. Misra (Eds.)(2024). Case studies on blended learning in higher Education: Policy, planning, and quality assurance. Springer https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-97-9388-4_7 Mishra, S., Panda, S. & Misra, P. K. (2024). Blended learning in higher education: Framing and futures. In S.Panda, S.Mishra. & P. Misra (Eds.) (2024). Case studies on blended learning in higher education: Policy, planning, and quality assurance. Springer https://link.springer.com/book/9789819793877 Panda, S. (2023). Quo Vadis - Stock taking and reflections on researching open, distance and digital education. In R. A. Folake and D. Coetzee (Eds.), Researching DE in the developing context: Building practice into theory. Pretoria: Emerging Scholars Initiative. Panda, S. (2023). Evolving learner support systems. In O. Zawacki-Richter & I. Jung (Eds.), Handbook of open, distance and digital education (pp 841-859). Springer Nature. https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-981-19-2080-6_46 Adhya, D. & Panda, S. (2022).Teacher educators' attitude towards technology-enabled learning and its incorporation into teaching-learning during and post-pandemic. Educational Media International, 59(2), 131-149. https://doi.org/10.1080/09523987.2022.2101204 Das,B.Panda, S.&Parthasarathi, V.(eds)(2022) Pedagogy in practice: Project-based learning in media policy and governance. Bloomsbury.https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/pedagogy-in-practice-9789354359675/ Das, R.P.& Panda, S.(Eds.)(2021), National Education Policy 2020: Issues, challenges, and reflections. Indira Gandhi National Open University. Mishra, S & Panda, S.(Eds)(2020)Technology-enabled learning: Policy, pedagogy and practices. Vancouver: The Commonwealth of Learning. http://oasis.col.org/handle/11599/3655 Panda, S. (2020). Return on investment from an open online course on open educational resources. In S. Mishra & S. Panda (eds.), Technology-enabled learning: Policy, pedagogy and practice (pp199-212). The Commonwealth of Learning. Panda, S. (2019). Linking skill programmes with academic programmes in higher education. Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia. Panda, S. (Ed.) (2017). Planning and management in distance education. HB. London & New York: Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Planning-and-Management-in-Distance-Education/Panda/p/book/9781138164871

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Prof. Sanjaya Mishra

Former Director (Education) and Education specialist, the Commonwealth of Learning, Canada

Dr Sanjaya Mishra has been highly regarded globally for his leadership in the field of open, distance and digital education (ODDE) for more than three decades. Starting his professional journey at the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) in 1993, Dr Mishra has served in various roles as a researcher, educator, administrator, and advocate for leveraging the power of open, flexible and distance learning as well as information and communication technologies to increase access to quality education and lifelong learning for all. His work at the IGNOU, UNESCO, and the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) have influenced the development of appropriate policies for open, flexible and distance education, technology-enabled learning, and the adoption and use of open educational resources (OER) in education around the world, especially in the Commonwealth countries. At UNESCO, his work led to the adoption of UNESCO open access policy, and the development of UNESCO OER Recommendations. Dr. Mishra’s contribution to research and scholarship in this field is equally substantive. Recently he led an international collaborative project with over 100 authors in editing the “Handbook of Open Universities Around the World” published by the Routledge. Recognizing his contributions, the Open Education Global conferred on Dr Mishra the 2025 Excellence in Open Education Award in the Board Awards Category, specifically as a Champion of Open Policy. Dr Mishra served as Director of the Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia, and Director (Education) at the Commonwealth of Learning (COL). In his recent role at the COL, he supported over 20 educational institutions around the Commonwealth in developing policy and capacity for blended learning. He designed and developed two award winning online platforms, named COLCommons (a short course platform for professional development), and the Commonwealth Digital Education Leadership Training in Action (C-DELTA) for teachers and students to develop digital education competencies. Under his leadership, COL offered several massive open online programmes. At the Indira Gandhi National Open University, he pioneered online learning with the OER-based Post Graduate Diploma in e- Learning, way back in 2009. Prior to this, in 2001, he also designed the social science online programme on resettlement and rehabilitation at IGNOU. For his contribution to distance education and open educational resources, he received the Prof. G. Ram Reddy Social Scientist Award in 2013. In recognition of his work on staff development, and as early as 2007, Dr. Mishra has been honored with the ISTD- Vivekanand National Award for Training and Human Resource Development.

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Prof. C.R.K. Murthy

Former Director, STRIDE, IGNOU and Academic Consultant, SOL, University of Delhi

https://in.linkedin.com/in/c-r-k-murthy-3803511b3

Dr Tony Mays

Director, Education, Commonwealth of Learning Vancouver, Canada

https://www.col.org/members/dr-tony-mays/

Dr Torunn Gjelsvik

Secretary General, International Council for Open and Distance Education - ICDE

Torunn Gjelsvik is Secretary General of the International Council for Open and Distance Education (ICDE), the leading global network for inclusive, open, and distance learning, based in Oslo, Norway. An EDEN Fellow, she champions lifelong learning and equitable access to education through diverse flexible learning modes. ICDE mobilizes more than 350 members and partners across 90+ countries, driving cross-country and cross-sector collaboration to advance accessible, sustainable, and innovative learning worldwide. Hosted by Norway since 1988 and in consultative partnership with UNESCO, ICDE aligns closely with the UN Sustainable Development Goals—particularly SDG4: Quality Education. Torunn holds a Master’s degree in Nordic languages and literature, complemented by studies in French, History, Management, and Strategic Communication. Active in the field since 2000, she has held senior roles nationally and internationally. Her work focuses on operationalizing SDG4—especially inclusive and equitable access—through global collaboration and knowledge sharing that benefits learners everywhere. A frequent keynote speaker and panel moderator, she brings practice-based insights on innovation, equity, and quality in technology-enhanced learning.

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Prof. Ganesan Kannabiran

Director, National Assessment and Accreditation Council

https://www.linkedin.com/in/prof-ganesan-kannabiran-095a0110/?originalSubdomain=in

Sir John Daniel

Chancellor, Acsenda School of Management Vancouver, BC, Canada (Ex-President, COL, Canada)

Sir John Daniel is a 50-year veteran of open and distance learning. He holds degrees from Oxford University (BA, MA, Metallurgy); the Université de Paris (Docteur ès-Sciences Physiques); Concordia University (MA, Ed.Tech.); and Thorneloe University (A. Th). His 32 honorary doctorates are from 17 countries. His appointments have included: École Polytechnique, Montreal (Professeur assistant et agrégé); Université TÉLUQ (Directeur des études); Athabasca University (VP Learning Services); Concordia University (VP Academic); Laurentian University (President); The UK Open University (Vice-Chancellor); UNESCO (Assistant Director-General for Education); and Commonwealth of Learning (President). His 400+ publications include his books Mega-Universities(1996) and Mega-Schools (2010). Three countries have recognised his work with national honours: France (Chevalier/Officier de l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques); the UK (Knight Bachelor 'for services to higher education'); and Canada (Officer of the Order of Canada ‘for his advancement of open learning and distance education in Canada and around the world’). He lives in Vancouver.

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Prof. Ami Upadhyay

Vice-Chancellor Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University, Gujarat

Prof. Ami Upadhyay currently serves as the esteemed Vice Chancellor of Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar State Open University, Gujarat since 2018. She holds an impressive academic background, with degrees in Bachelors, Masters, Masters in Philosophy, and a Doctorate in English Literature, as well as a Diploma in Naturopathy and Yogic Science. Prof. Upadhyay is a skilled Indian Classical Dancer and choreographer. With over two decades of experience in the Higher Education Sector, Prof. Upadhyay has contributed her expertise to various committees constituted by MHRD/Ministry of Education, UGC, AIU, NAAC, NIOS, State Education Department, Gujarat Sahitya Akademi, and numerous state and central universities across India. During her tenure, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar State Open University has achieved numerous accolades, including an A++ accreditation by NAAC – the only state university in Gujarat and the only State Open University in India to do so. Under her leadership, the university has also been awarded Category 1 autonomy by the UGC. Prof. Upadhyay has played a pivotal role in the successful implementation of NEP 2020 at BAOU, ensuring its adherence to the highest standards. Prof. Upadhyay has been honored with several prestigious awards, such as the Honorary Fellowship by the Commonwealth of Learning, Canada, the Pride of Nation Award, Manbhai Bhatt Pratisthit Nagrik Sanmaan, Award of Honor by CEMCA and IDEA, Life Time Achievement Award by AIPC, and NGS Vibrant Leadership Awards. She has been instrumental in introducing numerous innovative courses and programs at BAOU. Prof. Upadhyay has over 30 publications to her name and has participated in more than 100 conferences and invited talks.

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Rittika Chanda Parruck

Director of Education, British Council, India

Rittika is an education professional with over 25 years’ experience in research, teaching and education programme management. In her current role she is responsible for developing the British Council’s India Education Strategy and overseeing the planning and delivery of all British Council’s Education Programmes in India including schools, skills and higher education. She was a part of the Joint taskforce for developing the memorandum of understanding on the Mutual Recognition of Qualification between India and UK which was signed in July 2022. She also lead the delivery of British Councils flagship schools programme such as the Connecting Classrooms and International Dimension in Schools programme across India and Sri Lanka in her previous roles. She is deeply committed to supporting cross border collaboration in education and believes that greater exchange of knowledge and ideas through mobility will secure a sustainable and prosperous future not only for the UK and India but for the whole world. In October 2023, Rittika was awarded an honorary MBE for her services to UK education in India. Rittika has a master’s in biology and was a CSIR fellow at the Bose Institute, Kolkata investigating in vivo drug clearance systems. She also taught at a girls residential school for six fulfilling years before joining the British Council in 2005. She loves painting and doodling cartoons, reading, gardening and exploring nature whenever possible. She is based in Kolkata at her ancestral home with her husband, mother and her dog Candy.

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Prof G Chakrapani

Vice-Chancellor Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University, Hyderabad

https://www.linkedin.com/in/prof-chakrapani-ghanta-8a546513/?originalSubdomain=in

Prof Tankeshwar Kumar

Vice Chancellor, Central University of Haryana

linkedin.com/in/vice-chancellor-tankeshwar-kumar-74a788298?originalSubdomain=in

Rajendra Tripathi

Head of Education, Programmes and Partnership, India, British Council

linkedin.com/in/rajendra-tripathi-234b6b7?originalSubdomain=in

Prof Huiru (jane) Zheng

Professor of Computer Science, School of Computing, Ulster University, Belfast

https://www.ulster.ac.uk/staff/h-zheng

Prof Sanjeev Singh

Dean, Faculty of Technology, University of Delhi

https://in.linkedin.com/in/sanjeev-singh-370980b

Prof Fan Xianrui

Vice President, Open University of China

http://en.ouchn.edu.cn/index.php/about-v2/leadership

Dr Priyanka sharma

Deputy CEO Australian Council for Educational Research

https://people.acer.org/en/persons/priyanka-sharma/#:~:text=Research%20output%20(7),2%20Article