Keynote Speakers
We are pleased to confirm our two Keynote Speakers:
Associate Professor Nick Zepke
Massey University, New Zealand
Associate Professor Nick Zepke works in the Institute of Education at Massey University. He researches adult, higher and lifelong education in three interrelated areas: learner centred teaching, policy studies, and futures studies. Since 2006 research into improving students’ outcomes has dominated, particularly in the areas of student retention and engagement. His work has been both practical and theoretical. He has disseminated this research widely through his teaching and published it in respected international and local journals, commissioned reports, an edited book, book chapters and conference proceedings.
Distinguished Professor Vincent Tinto
Syracuse University, USA
Professor Tinto received his Ph.D. in education and sociology from The University of Chicago. He is currently Distinguished University Professor at Syracuse University. He has carried out research and has written extensively on higher education, particularly on student retention and the impact of learning communities on student growth and attainment. He has consulted widely with Federal and State agencies, with independent research firms, foundations, and with two and four-year institutions of higher education on a broad range of higher educational issues, not the least of which concern the retention and education of students in higher education.
He serves on the editorial boards of several journals and with various organizations and professional associations concerned with higher education. He chaired the national panel responsible for awarding $5 million to establish the first national center for research on teaching and learning in higher education and served as Associate Director of the $6 million National Center on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning, and Assessment funded by the U.S. Office of Education. He is involved in a number of national initiatives to improve college completion including Completion by Design funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Roadmap Project of the American Association of Colleges and Universities, the Institute of Higher Education’s Pathways to College Network project funded by the Lumina Foundation for Education, the American Council on Education Commission on Higher Education, and the American Association of Community Colleges’ Community Colleges: 21st Century Initiative.
He also serves as a Senior Scholar for the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Education and the Council for Opportunity in Education. His new book from The University of Chicago Press, entitled Completing College, lays out a framework for institutional action and shows how it can be applied to enhance the success of students in both two and four-year institutions.
