Dora Kourkoulou has a PhD in Educational Policy, Organization and Leadership from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She works as an Illini Science Policy Scholar with the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity on digital equity initiatives and outreach, and is developing a module on AI literacies for Illinois Extension. She holds an MA in Classical Literature from the University of Athens, Greece and an EdM in Human Resource Education from the University of Illinois. She has conducted ethnographic and interpretive research in and about the design of virtual worlds. Her dissertation, Cyber-Ludic Pedagogies: An Interpretive Framework on Playful Conflict in Video Games and Learning, examined narratives of resistance in and defection from video games, and their public pedagogical implications. Her interests lie in critical code and technology studies, and the intersections between AI computing, playfulness, and inclusive epistemologies in online spaces of action. She has edited a Special Issue for the Journal on Communications and Linguistics Studies titled ‘Data, Media, Knowledge’. Anastasia-Olga (Olnancy) Tzirides holds a Ph.D. in the Learning Design and Leadership Program from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). Her research interests include advanced digital technologies, artificial intelligence, user experience research, learning design, online education, as well as language and culture learning. Her dissertation research project is focused on exploring the potential of advanced digital technologies and artificial intelligence for collaborative language learning utilizing translanguaging and multimodal communication approaches. In the past, she has worked as a teaching assistant and learning designer for online graduate courses in the Learning Design and Leadership Program and the International Studies Program at the College of Education, UIUC. She was also an instructor at the Modern Greek Studies program at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and designed the elementary and intermediate level courses in an online format. Anastasia-Olga also holds a joint Master’s degree in Multilingual and Multicultural Education from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece and Université du Maine, France, and a Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. Bill Cope is a Professor in the Department of Education Policy, Organization and Leadership, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His research interests include theories and practices of pedagogy, cultural and linguistic diversity, and new technologies of representation and communication. His recent research has focused on the development of digital writing and assessment technologies, with the support of a number of major grants from the US Department of Education, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the National Science Foundation. The result has been the CGScholar multimodal writing and assessment environment. With Mary Kalantzis, he has co-authored or co-edited: New Learning: Elements of a Science of Education (2008/2012); Ubiquitous Learning (2009), Towards a Semantic Web: Connecting Knowledge in Academic Research (2009); Literacies (2012/2016); A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies (2016); E-Learning Ecologies (2017); and the two volume grammar of multimodal meaning, Making Sense and Adding Sense (2020). Mary Kalantzis was from 2006 to 2016 Dean of the College of Education at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Before this, she was Dean of the Faculty of Education, Language and Community Services at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, and President of the Australian Council of Deans of Education. With Bill Cope, she has co-authored or co-edited: New Learning: Elements of a Science of Education (2008/2012); Ubiquitous Learning (2009), Towards a Semantic Web: Connecting Knowledge in Academic Research (2009); Literacies (2012/2016); A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies (2016); E-Learning Ecologies (2017); and the two volume grammar of multimodal meaning, Making Sense and Adding Sense (2020).
