Board of Trustees

The Board of Trustees is responsible for the overall governance of ALT. Below are brief biographies of each member of the committee. In ALT's Constitution the Board of Trustees is also referred to as Central Executive Committee.

Helen O'Sullivan

Chair

Start Date: 24/06/20
End Date: 06/09/23

Helen has recently been appointed Provost and Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the University of Chester. As Pro Vice-Chancellor for Education, Professor O’Sullivan was previously responsible for taking strategic leadership for all aspects of education at Keele. She joined Keele on 1 st January 2018 and before that was Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor for Online Learning at the University of Liverpool.Helen is a member of the Advance HE Board and is Co-Convener of Advance HE’s PVC Network. Other external activities include membership of UUK International’s Transnational Education Advisory Board and of JISC’s Horizon Group.

Peter Bryant

Trustee

Start Date: 06/09/17
End Date: 06/09/23

Peter Bryant is Associate Dean (Education) and Associate Professor of Business Education at the University of Sydney Business School (Australia). He leads the educational strategy of the Business School and is the project sponsor of critical initiatives in co-design, digital storytelling, crowdsourcing, connected learning at scale and leadership for good. His research interests include pedagogical change, digital pedagogy and future of education. He is the Director of the Disruptive Innovations in Business Education Research Group. He is an active blogger and tweets @peterbryantHE.

Elizabeth Charles

Trustee

Start Date: 06/09/17
End Date: 06/09/23

Elizabeth has worked in the higher education sector and in Library and information for more than 15 years. Her areas of interest are technology enhanced learning, digital/information literacy and widening access; where these are employed in her current post as Assistant Director of Library Services at Birkbeck, University of London. One of her remits is to ensure that the Library adapts and adopts relevant systems and technologies to provide flexible access to the Library services and resources: from face to face teaching to running a webinar drop-in session for users be they academic/professional services staff or students. She has been involved with the Association of Learning Technology since 2013, first participating in the MOOC Open Course in Technology Enhanced Learning, then later, as a support tutor adviser, culminating in becoming CMALT in 2015 and thereafter CMALT Lead Assessor. Elizabeth promotes ALT to other learning technologists and those who use technology in their work; as well as to librarians and academics alike at CPD events. She is actively involved in TEL developments in her institution, working with academics and the Bloomsbury Learning Exchange consortium. Since 2018 she has been involved in organising conferences and webinars on ‘decolonising the curriculum’ in the LIS sector and academia.

Shonagh Douglas

Honorary Treasurer

Start Date: 15/06/21
End Date: 15/06/24

Shonagh Douglas in an Accounting and Finance Lecturer at the Robert Gordon University. She has a number of years’ experience in delivering online courses and has a particular interest in the use of learning technology to create interactive online resources and improve the virtual student learning experience. Shonagh is a Chartered Accountant - she previously trained and worked as an auditor with KPMG and continues to be a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland. Shonagh has completed a PhD which focussed on understanding the development of non-technical skills of trainee accountants.

Sharon Flynn

Trustee

Start Date: 04/09/19
End Date: 10/09/25

Sharon Flynn is Project Manager of the Enhancing Digital Capacity in Teaching and Learning project at the Irish Universities Association. She is leading the project across the seven Irish universities aimed at increasing the digital skills of Irish university graduates, through the professional development of staff who teach and support learning. Sharon is on secondment to the IUA from her role as Assistant Director at the Centre for Excellent in Learning and Teaching at the National University of Ireland, Galway, where she led a team of learning technologists.

David Hopkins

Trustee

Start Date: 07/09/22
End Date: 03/09/25

David currently works at Coventry University Online as a Senior Learning Designer. He joined CUOL in August 2018, having previously worked as a Teaching and Learning Consultant for Warwick Business School, and as a Learning Technologist at the University of Leicester and Bournemouth University before that. David developed his career in HE and LT from his background in data management and internet technologies on the UK south coast where he remains an advocate of the appropriate and considered use of technology to support and enhance learning. David is an active and social member of ALT, since he joined in 2010, has attended a number of ALTC conferences over his 15 year career in HE and LT, and has been a regular member of the ALTC conference review team. David obtained his CMALT in 2013, he has been a vocal supporter of CMALT and an assessor on many successful CMALT portfolios from across the membership, and has recently been an editor on the ALT blog.

Natalie Lafferty

Trustee

Start Date: 04/09/19
End Date: 10/09/25

Natalie Lafferty is Head of the Centre for Technology and Innovation in Learning at the University of Dundee. She leads a team that designs and delivers digital educational services across the University supporting the academic community in their use of the VLE, educational video, online assessment, WordPress and with the development of courses including MOOCs. Together with the team she provides guidance on learning design, content development and pedagogic approaches. She also works on strategy and policy developments at the University. Natalie has particular interests in open education, in working with students as partners and as co-creators of learning and interdisciplinary approaches to learning. She is the co-organiser of PressED an annual Twitter conference on WordPress in education, research and pedagogy. Natalie blogs at natalie-lafferty.net

Keith Smyth

Vice-Chair

Start Date: 04/09/19
End Date: 10/09/25

Keith Smyth is Professor of Pedagogy and Head of the Learning and Teaching Academy at the University of the Highlands and Islands, where he works with colleagues on strategic learning and teaching developments, funded projects, and supporting staff to engage in educational scholarship and research. Keith has particular interests in co-creative pedagogies and curriculum models, open education and scholarship, and digital educational strategy and policy. Keith developed the openly licensed 3E Framework for technology-enhanced learning which has been used extensively across FE and HE, and has been actively involved in several third sector education projects and organisations. This included a number of years as Vice Chair of LEAD (Linking Education and Disability) Scotland and as a Trustee of the social innovation charity People Know How. Keith blogs at www.3eeducation.org.

David White

President

Start Date: 24/06/20
End Date: 06/09/23

David White is the Head of Digital Education and Academic Practice at University of the Arts London. He has worked at the intersection of teaching, research and digital for over 20 years. David is best known for the Digital Visitors and Residents idea which provides a framework to understand what motivates online engagement in different forms. He is a keen advocate for Open Educational Practices and a well-known thinker in digital and open online education.

Puiyin Wong

Trustee

Start Date: 07/09/22
End Date: 03/09/25

Puiyin is a Learning Technologist at the Royal College of Art, with main responsibilities in supporting colleagues’ teaching and learning practice, and the strategic implementation of technology. She is currently doing her PhD in e-Research and TEL at Lancaster University; exploring how technology can support the development of learning networks and how knowledge is disseminated in these networks to the learners’ benefits. Prior to joining the RCA, she spent 15 years working in various student-facing roles at the University of the Arts London. Therefore, at the core of her professional values is a belief in compassionate and inclusive pedagogy; how technology enables learners to achieve their full potential. Through her social media presence (Twitter: @Puiyin), Puiyin is recognised as an early career researcher, and an experienced practitioner. She is connected to colleagues in the UK and internationally. Importantly, as a person from the Global Majority, she empathises with her peers from the Global Majority and other underrepresented groups. Puiyin runs a successful monthly TEL Researchers lecture series (Twitter: @TELresearchers). It introduces TEL Researchers from around the world to other researchers and practitioners.