Over the years, the ITHET conference series has had the privilege of welcoming distinguished Plenary Speakers. Please find a list of them below:

2026 (Lillehammer, Norway)

Keynote 1: Rewriting the syllabus: scaling pedagogy and research with Generative AI

Professor Vladan Devedzic
University of Belgrade; Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts
Belgrade, Serbia

Abstract

The emergence of Generative AI (GenAI) has brought many new challenges to higher education in decades. This keynote addresses these challenges in two parts. First, it maps the current research landscape, reviewing foundational papers and dominant trends – from GenAI’s role in personalized learning and automated feedback to the ethical challenges of assessment integrity. It also analyzes how GenAI is shifting the pedagogical focus from knowledge acquisition to critical knowledge augmentation and synthesis.

The second part presents some of the ongoing R&D efforts in higher education tailored for the GenAI era. This includes using GenAI to overhaul programming education for novices, specialists, and non-IT experts; leveraging LLMs for detailed student feedback analysis; proposing models for dynamic curriculum organization; and utilizing GenAI/LLMs for data collection to train machine learning models. Special focus is put on designing new frameworks to teach graduate students research methodologies that responsibly and effectively incorporate advanced AI tools.

This structure of the talk aims at indicating options for adapting teaching, research, and curriculum design to meet the challenges and harness the power of technology in the AI era.

Keynote 2: AI and Gamification for Readiness Education: Preparing Learners for Digital, Social, and Civic Resilience

Professor Vladimir Trajkovikj, Ph.D.
Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering
Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, North Macedonia

Biography

Vladimir Trajkovik is a Professor at the Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, North Macedonia. He is widely engaged in research and innovation at the intersection of artificial intelligence, digital education, gamification, media literacy, and cybersecurity education. His work is particularly dedicated to the design, evaluation, and responsible integration of AI-supported learning approaches that strengthen student engagement, digital resilience, and educational quality in contemporary learning environments.

Abstract

The growing complexity of contemporary risk environments requires schools to prepare learners not only for cybersecurity threats, but also for a broader spectrum of readiness challenges that include misinformation, digital risks, crisis response, responsible decision-making, and resilient participation in society. This keynote addresses that challenge in two parts. First, it examines the changing meaning of preparedness in education, particularly in contexts such as Norway’s Total Defence Year 2026, where self-preparedness, cooperation, awareness, and source criticism are presented as part of a wider societal resilience agenda. It argues that preparedness in schools should be understood not only as emergency response knowledge, but also as a pedagogical framework for developing judgment, responsibility, adaptability, and civic resilience across different age groups.

The second part presents how principles developed in game-based cybersecurity education can be extended into a broader school-readiness model. Building on approaches which combine AI-driven narratives, gamification, blended learning, and real-life problem scenarios, the keynote will show how similar designs can be adapted for primary, lower-secondary, and upper-secondary education. Rather than focusing only on technical cyber skills, such activities can support age-appropriate learning about preparedness, ethical action, critical media literacy, coordinated response, and decision-making under uncertainty. This opens the possibility of using AI not merely as a content generator, but as a support layer for personalization, adaptive storytelling, feedback, and scenario variation in readiness education.

Keynote 3: Didactical technologies – origins, critical perspectives and the continued risks and promises of ICT in Higher Education

Emeritus Professor Yngve Troye Nordkvelle
University of Inland Norway

Yngve Troye Nordkvelle is since 2004 a professor of education at the Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences (former Lillehammer University College, Norway), and he is now currently Head of Department for Teaching and Learning. He has been an essential and vital member of Network 6: Open Learning: Media, Environments and Cultures, and he has substantially contributed to development by shaping the scope and focus of the network. He has been attending nearly all ECER conferences since 1996, and he has been the network’s Co-Convenor from 2003 to 2007 and Link Convenor from 2007 to 2010.

Abstract

Teaching and learning are risky businesses. The probability that what students learn is similar to the stuff teachers intend to teach, is low. The idea of having a singular, dominant voice in the classroom, is ridiculous. The intention to improve the probability was a concern for the renaissance reformers, who reinvented the word “technology” from Aristotle and the Roman rhetorician Seneca, meaning “finding out the grammar of thinking”. How words and language work was the core of the riddle. The technology of the endeavour to solve the riddle was the “art of teaching” – or “didactics”. This art was pivotal in the buildings, designs, tools and volitions that shaped “education” at large. The promises of ICT in education at large has been that teaching and learning will become more effective than previous technologies. Modern AI is the latest budding technology offering even bolder promises. The risks are less prevalent in the contemporary debate about new technologies. The challenge is, as the philosophers Nicholas Burbules and Thomas A. Callister jr. reminded us, that promises need to be explored and the risks must be exposed. Every new gadget, software, platform or network introduced to us, pose new promises and new risks as tools for learning – or distraction.

Keynote 4: Learning by doing at INN Rena

Bjørn Tallak Bakken
Associate Professor at INN, with a secondary position at NORD University

Biography

With a PhD in Crisis Management from BI Norwegian Business School, he specializes in preparedness, crisis management, and societal safety and security. Bakken is also academic head of INN-PROTECT – Center for preparedness and crisis management at Rena, Norway. He is currently Norwegian project manager of the Interreg project “Incredilab” (www.criseit.org), that focuses on collaborative crisis exercises that uses technology support (AI, VR) to enrich crisis scenarios.

He is a frequent participant and presenter at international academic conferences such as Academy of Management (AoM) Annual Meeting, System Dynamics Conference (SDC), and the International Command and Control Research and Technology Symposium (ICCRTS). He is also a review board member of the journal BESS (Behavioural Economics and Social Systems), and a regular reviewer for Current Psychology (CUPS) and Personality and Individual Differences (PAID), among others. His latest publication is a scholarly book (in Norwegian) on crisis preparedness and management in large private and public organizations: https://fagbokforlaget.no/produkt/9788245048087-etterpaklok-pa-forhand

Currently, my research interests are centered on the following problems:

• In what way, and to what degree, may present and future AI technology positively contribute to global societal welfare, safety and security?
• What are the limitations and pitfalls associated with applying partially or fully autonomous AI technology to technical and societal problems on a larger scale?

Abstract

At the INN-PROTECT center at Rena (Inland Norway), we believe in “learning by doing”. Therefore, practical training and exercises are at the forefront, where skills such as decision-making, creativity and improvisation, cooperation and communication are built and cultivated. With systems thinking and critical reflection as common academic denominators, we use novel technology, such as AI and VR/XR that make critical scenarios “come alive” and allowing learners to interact while solving problems for the benefit of their team, organization, and society. The skills and competencies acquired at INN-PROTECT are transferable both ways: practicing critical decision-making, improvisation and communication in a risk-free, simulated environment is the ideal preparation for real-life preparedness and crisis management. Conversely, personnel having a professional background within the military or the emergency services will find that the didactics at INN-PROTECT open for creativity, exploration and experimentation – and their strategic repertoire as crisis managers will both broaden and deepen when they have “battled” the most challenging problems facing society today.

2024

• Professor Stephanie Farrell (IFEES President and Rowan University, New Jersey, USA)
• Professor Yakut Gazi, Ph.D. (Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA)
• Associate Professor Davide Buscaldi (USPN, France)

2022

• Anthony E. Ward (Univ. of York, UK). Title: Is Ghostwriting something Higher Education is willing and able to challenge?
• Anna Friesel, retired (Technical University of Denmark). Title: 21st century engineering education for Inventions and Innovations in Technology

2021

• Professor Sirin Tekinay, Chair (GEDC), Board Member (IFEES, SEFI)
• Prof. Fae Martin, Deputy Dean Learning and Teaching, School of Engineering and Technology at Central Queensland University
• Prof. Marilyn Wells, Head, College of Information and Communication Technology, School of Engineering and Technology at Central Queensland University

2019

• Keith Bowman, University of Maryland Baltimore County, US. Changing Learner Contexts: Implications for Equity, Inclusion and Career Success.
• Janusz A. Koziński, Brock University, Canada. Reflecting Megatrends and Future Skills in Higher Education.
• Matthew W. Ohland, Purdue University, US. Monitoring and Improving Student Team Experiences.

2018

• Stephanie Farrell, ASEE President-Elect, Rowan University, US. Spatial Skills Training – Supporting Access and Equity in STEM Education.
• Luis Gomes, University Nova de Lisboa & UNINOVA-CTS, Portugal. Remote Laboratories Role Within Engineering Education.
• Piet Kommers, University of Twente, Netherlands. Beyond the Learning Perspective.
• Anthony Ward, York University, UK. Measuring and Certifying Generic Skills: Should We and Can We?

2017

• Robin Braun, University of Technology Sydney, Australia. Can We Use New Ways of Modelling Complex Systems to Optimise Student Learning?
• Rob Reilly, IEEE Education and Computer Societies, US. You Can Receive the Nobel Prize!
• Sirin Tekinay, Isik University, Turkey. If All the Books in All the Libraries Talk to One Another: What Technology Can Do for Education?

2016

• Stephanie Farrell, Rowan University, US. Cross-Cultural Exploration of Spatial Visualisation Abilities of First Year STEM Students.
• Arnold Pears, Upsala University, Sweden. The Rise and Fall of MOOC: What Can We Learn About the Education of the Future?