Dr. Tomayess Issa is a senior lecturer at the School of Information Systems at Curtin University, Australia. Tomayess completed her doctoral research in Web development and Human Factors. As an academic, she is also interested in establishing teaching methods and styles to enhance the students’ learning experiences and resolve problems that students face. Tomayess Issa Conference and Program Co-Chair of the IADIS International Conference on Internet Technologies and Society and ADIS International Conference on International Higher Education. Furthermore, she initiated the IADIS conference for Sustainability, Green IT and Education. Currently, she conducts research locally and globally in information systems, Human-Computer Interaction, Usability, Social Networking, Teaching and Learning, Sustainability, Green IT and Cloud Computing. Tomayess participated in a couple of conferences and published her work in several peer-reviewed journals, books, book chapters, papers and research reports Tomayess Issa is a Project leader in the International research network (IRNet-EU (Jan2014 – Dec 2017)) to study and develop new tools and methods for advanced pedagogical science in the field of ICT instruments, e-learning and intercultural competences and she is a senior research member of ISRLAb (Information Society Research Lab) from International Association for Development of the Information Society.Piet Kommers focused his teaching and research on the topic Media, Education and Communication. His study Pedagogy and School Education at the University of Utrecht was dedicated to find out how learning dialogues can be made adaptive to the actual state in the learner's mind. As minor he built an experimental setup in order to detect hemispheric asymmetry in the detection of a simple figure in the larger visual context. He received the academic reward for excellent research achievement.
The University of Utrecht offered Piet Kommers the appointment of junior researcher at the topic of "Small group learning through collaborative problem solving". A computer-based observation system was developed and led to the conclusion that the more heterogeneous group composition triggered a wider elicitation of prior concepts and reflection during joint problem solving.
During the episode 1982-2015 Piet Kommers was appointed by the University of Twente that made him elaborate further research into educational technology, new media like hypertext, concept mapping and virtual spaces for surgical training. He was elected to lead the Nato Advanced Research Workshops into "Cognitive Learning Tools" and instigated quite many international European research projects. As associate professor he became responsible for the courses "Designing New Media Applications", "Visual Communication" and "Social Media for Communication."
Fontys University for Applied Sciences welcomed his part-time position as professor at the aspect of "Didactic Integration of ICT" (2003-2005). In this function he conveyed teacher trainers in the new media prospects like mobile- and networked learning.
Piet Kommers is renown keynote speaker at international conferences around the world and was elected as overall chairman of the IADIS conferences on Societal Impact of ICT. He is Associate- en Executive Editor of the respective journals "International Journal of Continuous Engineering Education and Life-long Learning" and the "International Journal for Web-based Communities".
As professor Educational Technologies for UNESCO, Piet Kommers wrote numerous reports for authorities in Eastern European- and Asian countries on how ICT and new media increasingly work catalytic on the continuous evolution of education, training and lifelong learning.
From November 2014 Piet Kommers joins the scientific staff at the University of Utrecht for supervising Master level students in Educational Science.
His web site can be found here.
Theodora Issa is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Management at Curtin University. She is the recipient of the Emerald/European Fund for Management Development 2010 Outstanding Research Award for her PhD thesis under the title ‘Ethical mindsets, aesthetics and spirituality: a mixed-methods approach analysis of the Australian services sector’. Theodora holds the title of Curtin Business School’s ‘New Researcher of the Year’ that was bestowed on her in 2010. Theodora is the recipient of multi awards and grants from the faculty, university and external bodies. She has published and continues to publish research work on business ethics, sustainability, technology, social media, corporate social responsibility, and higher education. Currently, Theodora is conducting her post-doctoral research on ethical mindsets, spirituality and aesthetics and currently working on a manuscript for a book on ‘Ethical Mindsets: A Comparative Study’ for publication with Springer, Switzerland. Theodora is a co-researcher in projects on sustainable development and business strategies, cloud computing, green IT and sustainability, corruption resistance, misconduct, social media and social awareness. Theodora is a member of the ‘Sustainability and Leadership Research Network (SLRN)’. Theodora is also a member in the International research network (IRNet) for study and development of new tools and methods for advanced pedagogical science in the field of ICT instruments, e-learning and intercultural competences with some twenty scholars from Europe.Theodora is an Associate Editor, and a member of editorial committees of international journals and a member of organising committees of international conferences, also a reviewer of journals such as the Journal of Business Ethics. Theodora holds memberships in several local and international bodies including Australia and New Zealand Academy of Management (ANZAM), American Academy of Management (AOM), and European Business Ethics Network, UK (EBEN-UK). Theodora is one of the webmasters of her community's website http://soca.cjb.net (since 1995) and is one of the editors of the weekly bulletin since 1995 that is currently available online under URL http://noohro.cjb.net. In 2012 Theodora was appointed a delegate to the 10th Assembly, Busan, South Korea, of the World Council of Churches (WCC) representing her Syrian Orthodox Church. In November 2013, and during this assembly’s sessions, Dr Theodora Issa was elected a member of the Central Committee of the WCC representing the Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and all the East. It is worthwhile noting that this is the first time a female member has been elected to this position on behalf of the Syrian Orthodox Church. In July 2014 Theodora was nominated by the church and later voted as a member of the ‘Education and Ecumenical Formation (EEF) Commission of the WCC. In June 2016 Theodora was nominated by the church and later voted as a member of the Permanent Committee on Consensus and Collaboration (PCCC).Pedro Isaías is an associate professor at The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia. Previously he was associate professor at the Universidade Aberta (Portuguese Open University) in Lisbon, Portugal, responsible for several courses and director of the master degree program in Management / MBA. Was director of master degree program in Electronic Commerce and Internet for 10 years. He holds a PhD in Information Management (in the specialty of information and decision systems) from the New University of Lisbon. Author of several books, book chapters, papers and research reports, all in the information systems area, he has headed several conferences and workshops within the mentioned area. He has also been responsible for the scientific coordination of several EU funded research projects. He is also member of the editorial board of several journals and program committee member of several conferences and workshops. At the moment he conducts research activity related to E-Commerce and E-Business, E-Learning, Information Systems in general, and WWW related areas.Touma B. Issa holds Ph.D. from Murdoch University, Western Australia. He is an Adjunct Research Associate at Murdoch University. He has an over twenty-five years’ experience in academia and industry in chemistry. Between 2009 and 2014, he presented lectures on Energy Storage to post graduate students. His research interests include: analytical chemistry particularly relating to atmospheric pollution, electrochemistry as applied to batteries where he was involved in planning and conducting research and development activities to optimize the smart flow battery chemistry technologies, surface modified electrodes, waste water purification and remediation of ground drinking water. Touma is a member of The Royal Australian Chemical Institute since 1993, and a member of The Electrochemical Society since 2006.