Speakers

Andy Hargreaves

Andy Hargreaves is the Thomas More Brennan Chair in the Lynch School of Education at Boston College. Before that, he was the co-founder and co-Director of the International Centre for Educational Change at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.

Andy is the founding Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Educational Change and leading editor of the first and second International Handbooks of Educational Change. His books have achieved outstanding writing awards from the American Educational Research Association, the American Libraries Association, the National Staff Development Council and the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, and are translated into many languages. His most recent books are Professional Capital: Transforming Teaching in Every School (with Michael Fullan – Teachers’ College Press 2012), and The Global Fourth Way (with Dennis Shirley – Corwin, 2012). His most recent research reports are on organizations that perform beyond expectations in business, sport and education, and on whole school changes in Ontario that benefit students with special educational needs.

Andy has received many awards including an Honorary Doctorate from Scandinavia’s oldest university (Uppsala) and the Whitworth Award for contributions to educational research in Canada.

Mona Mourshed

Mona Mourshed leads McKinsey & Company’s Global Education Practice. She supports school system improvement and education to employment programs around the world. Mona is the author of Education to Employment: Designing a System That Works (2012), How the World’s Most Improved School Systems Keep Getting Better (2010) and How the World’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top (2007). She has a B.A. from Stanford University and a Ph.D. from MIT. Mona was selected as one of Fortune Magazine’s ’40 under 40’ (2011).   

Howard Gardner

Howard Gardner is the Hobbs Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and Senior Director of Harvard Project Zero. Among numerous honors, Gardner received a MacArthur Prize Fellowship in 1981 and the Prince of Asturias Award for Social Sciences in 2011. He has received honorary degrees from twenty-nine colleges and universities. In 2005 and again in 2008, he was selected by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines as one of the 100 most influential public intellectuals in the world. The author of twenty-eight books translated into thirty-two languages, and several hundred articles, Gardner is best known in educational circles for his theory of multiple intelligences, a critique of the notion that there exists but a single human intelligence that can be assessed by standard psychometric instruments. He has also written extensively on creativity, leadership, professional ethics, and the arts. His latest book Truth, Beauty, and Goodness Reframed was published in April 2011. His latest co-authored book Multiple Intelligences Around the World was published in the summer of 2009. For more information see www.howardgardner.com.

Nick Tate

Nicholas Tate was educated at the universities of Oxford (Balliol College), Bristol (Department of Education), and Liverpool (Institute of Latin American Studies). He is a member of the IB Board of Governors and Chair of the Board’s Education Committee. Following a career as a teacher, teacher trainer and chief examiner in England and Scotland, Dr Tate joined England’s national curriculum council in 1989 at the time of the establishment of the English national curriculum. Dr Tate was chief adviser to the secretary of state for education throughout the period between 1994 and 2000, under both Conservative and Labour governments. From 2000 to 2005 he was also an adviser to the French Minister of Education.  Throughout his career, Dr Tate has written a large number of articles on aspects of education and history, as well as seven history textbooks for schools. Since 2011 Dr Tate has been executive chairman of a network of independent schools located in the UK, USA, South Africa and Hungary, four of which are IB world schools and two of which have candidate status for PYP, IBDP and IBCC. He was appointed Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in 2001, in recognition of his lifelong contributions to education.

Andreas Schleicher

Andreas Schleicher is Deputy Director for Education and Skills and Special Advisor on Education Policy to OECD’s Secretary-General. He also provides strategic oversight over OECD’s work on the development and utilisation of skills and their social and economic outcomes. This includes the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the OECD Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), the OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) and the development and analysis of benchmarks on the performance of education systems (INES). Before joining the OECD, he was Director for Analysis at the International Association for Educational Achievement (IEA). He studied Physics in Germany and received a degree in Mathematics and Statistics in Australia. He is the recipient of numerous honours and awards, including the “Theodor Heuss” prize, awarded in the name of the first president of the Federal Republic of Germany for “exemplary democratic engagement”. He holds an honorary Professorship at the University of Heidelberg.

Alan November

Alan November is a published author of two bestsellers: "Empowering Students with Technology" and "Web Literacy for Educators". His most recent book is "Who Owns the Learning" in which he discusses the power of the teacher and the student to use technology in their learning. His expertise includes planning across curriculum, staff development, new school design, community building and leadership development. Author and educator Alan November has always believed that students should be empowered to be critical thinkers and directors of their own learning.
He began his career as an oceanography teacher at an island reform school for boys in Boston Harbor. He later became a computer science teacher in Lexington, Massachusetts, where he pioneered internet-based student work in the classroom. In 2001, the Eisenhower National Clearinghouse listed him as one of eight educators to provide leadership into the future.

Cathryn Berger Kaye

A former classroom teacher and author, Cathryn is president of CBK Associates—International Education Consultants. Cathryn travels across the globe providing professional development, conference keynotes, in-depth institutes, and exceptional education resources on service learning, 21st century competencies, social and emotional realms, climate and culture, youth engagement, effective teacher strategies, and environmental sustainability. All her education work aligns with current common core standards and best teaching practices.

She is the author of The Complete Guide to Service Learning: Proven, Practical Ways to Engage Students in Civic Responsibility, Academic Curriculum, & Social Action, the Kids in Action workbook series, and with Philippe Cousteau and EarthEcho International, has coauthored two books: Going Blue: A Teen Guide to Protecting Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers, and Wetlands and Make A Splash! A Kids Guide to Protecting Our Oceans, Lakes, Rivers, and Wetlands.

Cathryn is known internationally for exemplary work with 21st century competencies and all of her Strategies for Success with 21st Century Skills programs integrate high level literacy skills, social and emotional development, community engagement through service learning, along with forward thinking pedagogies and brain research. 

Cristobal Cobo

Cristóbal Cobo (Phd) is a research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, where he coordinates research on innovation, open knowledge initiatives and future of learning research projects. Currently he works on Internet Science, OportUnidad, K-Networks and SESERV (European Commission).  He is also coordinator of a collective project on informal, non-formal and invisible learning - a collaborative  book and an online repository of bold  ideas for designing cultures of  sustainable innovation. Cristóbal has been a Visiting Fellow at the Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance, University of Oxford and  Professor and Director of Communication and New Technologies and editor of the educational platform of the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences, Mexico.

He has worked on academic projects with organizations such as the Open University (UK), the University of Oxford, the University of Minnesota, the University of Toronto, the Open University of Catalonia, the Mexican Ministry of Public Education, and the Ministries of Education of Chile and Argentina, the Telefonica Foundation (Argentina and Mexico) and the  European Union. He has been invited Expert for RAND EU in future trends on technology and education commissioned by the Bureau of European Policy Advisors (BEPA). 

Dr. Cobo currently serves on the board of the Global Open Educational Resource (OER) Graduate Network.

Kevin Hawkins

Kevin Hawkins has worked as a teacher, principal, school head, and social worker in the UK, Africa, and Europe. He brings to education a holistic understanding of children and young people from his lifelong work with adolescents, and he strives to support the development of young minds through enhancing students’ self-awareness and emotional intelligence.

Kevin has introduced and led mindfulness-based training for students (11-18 years), teachers and parents at the International School of Prague, where he is the Middle School Principal. Kevin takes his inspiration from studying with leaders in mindfulness in the West, including Mark Williams (Oxford Mindfulness Centre), Jon Kabat-Zinn, Saki Santorelli, Florence Meleo-Meyer, Melissa Blacker (UMass Medical School, Center for Mindfulness), Dr. Amy Saltzman (Still Quiet Place) and through retreats at Plum Village in France and Gaia House in the UK. He currently manages international developments for the Mindfulness in School Project’s “.b” curriculum (an 8 week course for teenagers from the UK) and he trains teachers to teach the .b course.  Kevin is a co-founder of The Mindwell Foundation, a non-profit organization aimed at supporting the development of wellbeing through mindfulness and social-emotional learning in schools.  He is working with the International Baccalaureate Organisation to introduce their staff to mindfulness and to support the IBO’s interest in encouraging schools worldwide to explore mindfulness as a potential tool to promote social-emotional learning and wellbeing.

Kara Hordlow Smith

Kara Hordlow Smith is a founding board member of the MindWell Foundation, a non-profit organization offering a global network of best practices and evidence-based approaches to social and emotional learning. She also serves as the Managing Director of The Mindfulness in Schools Project, where she is helping to build out the delivery of mindfulness courses for school communities and educational organizations worldwide. 

A mindfulness teacher and anthropologist by training, and an international business consultant by profession, Kara is particularly interested in transferring and localizing ancient wisdom to modern-day, “real life” situations that are approachable by all. Having lived and worked in the US, Europe, Asia and the Middle East throughout her 20-year career, she currently calls The Netherlands home. Since 2005, Kara has been teaching mindfulness, well-being, and peak performance to students, parents, athletes, and corporate leaders, both in a classroom setting and on a consultancy basis.