Digital Directions in Learning: Bridging Informal and Formal Education

The Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access (SCLDA) hosted "Digital Directions in Learning", an online discussion series with leaders and researchers in public education, after school programming, museum education, and educational technology on the last Wednesday of each month, in February-June 2014.

Welcome:
Stephanie Norby, Director Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access, Smithsonian Institution

Moderator:
Claudine Brown, Assistant Secretary for Education and Access, Smithsonian Institution

Panelists:

Richard Culatta (Ex-officio)
Director, Office of Educational Technology
US Department of Education
Richard Culatta has experience in K-12, higher education, and workplace learning environments. His current work focuses on leveraging technology to create personalized learning experiences for all students and promoting increased connectivity to improve access to education and make college more affordable. Previously, his work centered around leveraging social media to create effective large-scale distributed learning environments.

Mark Warschauer
Professor of Education and Informatics at the University of California, Irvine
Associate Dean of UC Irvine's School of Education.
Dr. Warschauer is director of the Digital Learning Lab at UC Irvine, where, together with colleagues and students, he works on a range of research projects related to digital media in education. In K-12 education, his team is developing and studying cloud-based tools for writing, exploring digital scaffolding for reading, investigating one-to-one programs with iPads and Chromebooks, examining use of interactive mobile robots for virtual inclusion, and developing mobile apps for language learning. The DLL team is also exploring new approaches to data mining, machine learning, and learning analytics to analyze the learning and educational data that result from use of new digital tools.

Kylie A. Peppler
Assistant Professor, Learning Sciences Program
Indiana University, Bloomington
An artist by training, Kylie Peppler engages in research that focuses on the intersection of arts, media, new technologies, and informal learning.. Currently, Peppler seeks to study the media arts practices of urban, rural, and (dis)abled youth in order to better understand and support literacy, learning, and the arts in the 21st Century.

Kevin Crowley
Professor of Learning Sciences and Policy, School of Education and Learning Research & Development Center
Director, University of Pittsburgh Center for Learning in Out-Of-School Environments (UPCLOSE)
University of Pittsburgh
Dr. Crowley has been co-lead on a National Science Foundation-funded center that works to strengthen and connect the informal science education community by catalyzing conversation and collaboration across the entire field with a focus on improving practice, documenting evidence of impact, and communicating the contributions of informal science education.