Ulrich Teichler
Professor, International Centre for Higher Education Research (INCHER-Kassel),
University of Kassel (Germany) from 1978 to 2013

Bio and Research Interest

Ulrich Teichler was for 35 years professor on higher education at the International Centre for Higher Education Research (INCHER Kassel) and at the Department of Social Sciences, University of Kassel (Germany), and he was about half the period Director of the Centre. Already as a student (at the Free University of Berlin), he became member (from 1965 to 1978) member of the Max Planck Institute for Educational Research in Berlin, when he also submitted his doctoral dissertation to the University of Bremen. His research activities and publications focused on higher education and the world of work, systems of higher education in comparative perspective, international mobility and cooperation in higher education, the academic profession as well as the situation of higher education research. He analyzed the search of higher education to strike a balance between accepting societal expectations and playing a proactive, “unexpected” role for society. For example, he emphasized that logics of national higher education systems varied more substantially that widespread assumptions on global trends suggest, he undertook many research projects funded by “political” and governmental agencies. He spent extended periods of research in Japan, the U.S. and the Netherlands, he was guest lecturer or visiting professor in ten countries, and his academic activities brought him to more than 80 countries. More than 500 publications each were written by him in German and in English, and more than 200 articles were published into 20 other languages. He was the founder in 1988 of the internationally most active association of researchers in his area of expertise, i.e. the Consortium of Higher Education Researchers (CHER).

Oon-Seng Tan

Bio and Research Interest

Professor Tan is the Director of the Centre for Research in Child Development, National Institute of Education, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.  He also is the Chen Yidan Visiting Global Fellow, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard University.  Previously Professor Tan was the Director of the National Institute of Education (NIE), Singapore, where he played a significant role in enhancing teacher education and education research.  He also served as Dean of Teacher Education at NIE where he spearheaded the Teacher Education for the 21st Century (TE21) initiative as a major milestone innovation for teacher education both nationally and internationally. 

Albert C. Tuijnman

Managerial Advisor for Education and Public Research
Innovation and Competitiveness Department
European Investment Bank

Bio and Research Interest

Albert Tuijnman is Managerial Advisor in the Education and Public Research Division at the European Investment Bank. He is responsible for the economic appraisal of large-scale investment projects in the education and science systems of all European countries, covering the continuum from preschools to vocational training centres and elite universities, public research institutes and science councils. The outstanding investment portfolio exceeds € 20 bn in present value. Earlier in his career he was Principal Administrator in the Education and Training Division at OECD and Professor and Director of the Institute of International Education at Stockholm University.

Servaas van der Berg
Professor (National Research Foundation Chair in Social Policy) at Stellenbosch University (South Africa)

Bio and Research Interest

He joined the Department of Economics at University of Stellenbosch in 1982, currently holding the rank of Professor of Economics. He teaches courses in Poverty and Distribution, Development Economics, and Economics of Education.  During his career he has served as a consultant for numerous national and international organizations and agencies, including the World Bank, UNICEF, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Development Bank of Southern Africa, the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), and the Institute for Policy Analysis (AIPA).  He also has worked collaboratively on a number of economic and educational projects.  His most recent project is called “Binding Constraints in Education,” and is a multi-part study financed by the Project to Support Pro-Poor Policy Development, a partnership project between the South African Presidency and the European Union. This multifaceted project is investigating all facets of the school education system to assist in identifying the major constraints to improved learning in schools.  His research interests include economic development, poverty, income distribution, and social policy.

Maris A. Vinovskis
University of Michigan Bentley Professor of History, Institute for Social Science Research Professor, and Professor at the Gerald R. Ford of Public Policy.

Bio and Research Interest

Vinovskis was born in Riga, Latvia and is a naturalized citizen of the United States.  He was Deputy Staff Director to the U.S. House Select Committee on Population in the late 1970s and a frequent consultant on population and adolescent pregnancy issues in the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in the early 1980s. He worked in the U.S. Department of Education in the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations on educational research and policy. He was a member of the congressionally-mandated Independent Review Panels for Goals 2000 and No Child Left Behind during both the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. He also was a member of the Bush-Cheney Transition Education Advisory Committee.

Stella Vosniadou
Strategic Professor 

Bio and Research Interest

Stella Vosniadou is currently a Strategic Professor at Flinders University in South Australia and an Emeritus Professor in the Department of Philosophy and History of Science at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. Her research interests are in the areas of learning, cognitive development and conceptual change in the learning of science and mathematics. She has more than 150 publications including authored and edited books, articles in refereed journal and edited volumes and over 14,000 citations. She is well known internationally for her research for which she received the 2011 Distinguished International Contributions to Child Development Award by the Society for Research in Child Development.

Herbert ("Herb") J. Walberg
(retired) Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Stanford University Hoover Institution
Formerly professor Harvard University and University of Illinois at Chicago

Bio and Research Interest

Herb served as a founding member of the National Assessment Governing Board, referred to as "the national school board," given its mission to set education standards for U.S. students and measure progress in achieving them. He was also appointed by the President and approved by the Senate as a founding member of the National Board for Education Sciences, which provides policy guidance and oversight for education research.

Herb has given invited lectures in Australia, Belgium, China, England, France, Germany, Italy, Israel, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, Singapore, South Africa, Sweden, Taiwan, Venezuela, and the U .S to educators and policy makers. He has frequently testified before U.S. Congressional committees, state legislators, and federal courts.  

Herb chaired the Scientific Advisory Group for the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development project on international educational indicators. He has advised the government officials in Israel, Japan, Portugal, Singapore, Sweden, and the U.K. on education research and policy.

Herb has written or edited more than 70 books and written about 300 articles on such topics as educational effectiveness and exceptional human accomplishments. In his career he specialized in the measurement and analysis of conditions that make for outstanding accomplishments.

J. Douglas Willms
Canada Research Chair in Literacy and Human Development
President and CEO, The Learning Bar

Research Interest

J. Douglas Willms is a Professor at the University of New Brunswick (UNB) and holds the Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Literacy and Human Development. He is the President of the International Academy of Education, a Member of the US National Academy of Education, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He is the President and CEO of The Learning Bar Inc., an international company that provides research-based tools and training for enhancing the life chances of children and youth.

Dr. Willms has published over two hundred research articles and monographs pertaining to youth literacy, children’s health, the accountability of schooling systems, and the assessment of national reforms. He played lead roles in developing Canada’s National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY) and the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). He and his colleagues designed the Early Years Evaluation (EYE), an instrument for the direct assessment of children’s developmental skills at ages 3 to 6, and OurSchool, an evaluation system for the continuous monitoring of student engagement and well-being. Dr. Willms is the lead researcher in designing the contextual questionnaires for PISA for Development, an initiative for low- and middle-income countries aimed at tracking international educational targets in the post-2015 UN framework. His research team is also working with school leaders in 30 First Nations schools in the design and implementation of Confident Learners, a whole-school and whole-community literacy program based on the science of literacy and instructional practice.

Ludger Woessmann

Professor of Economics, University of Munich
Director, Ifo Center for the Economics of Education

Bio and Research Interest

Ludger Woessmann is Professor of Economics at the University of Munich and Director of the Ifo Center for the Economics of Education at the Ifo Institute. His main research interests are the determinants of long-run prosperity and of student achievement. He uses microeconometric methods to answer applied, policy-relevant questions of the empirical economics of education, often using international student achievement tests. Special focusses address the importance of education for economic prosperity – individual and societal, historical and modern – and the importance of institutions of the school systems for efficiency and equity. Further research topics cover aspects of economic history, economics of religion, and the Internet. His work was rewarded, among others, with the Gossen Prize of the German Economic Association, the Young Economist Award of the European Economic Association, the EIB Prize of the European Investment Bank, and the Bruce H. Choppin Memorial Award of the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement.

Yong Zhaoe
Foundations Distinguished Professor, University of Kansas

Research Interest

Yong Zhao is a Foundations Distinguished Professor in the School of Education at the University of Kansas. He is also a professorial fellow at the Mitchell Institute for Health and Education Policy, Victoria University in Australia. His works focus on the implications of globalization and technology on education.