Group of three females and one male in front of large screen

Gamification, Xboxes, and ex-prisoners: Brighton hosts 21st European Conference on e-Learning

The University of Brighton was proud to host the 21st European Conference on e-Learning (ECEL 2022), which took place on 27-28 October 2022. 

Supported by the School of Architecture, Technology and Engineering, the conference was chaired by Brighton Principal Lecturers Dr Panagiotis Fotaris and Dr Andrew Blake. More than a hundred delegates from 33 countries attended in person and online, to hear about cutting-edge research in the field of technology-enhanced learning.

The event began with a welcome message from the Dean of the School of Architecture, Technology and Engineering, Professor Mohammed Arif, before Liz Cable gave the keynote presentation. A senior lecturer at Leeds Trinity University and member of the International Research Centre for Interactive Storytelling, Ms Cable talked about the potential of educational escape rooms in her address titled Broken Games for Learning

“A highlight for me has been the presentation by Chuck Sigmund, owner of Learning & Development for Microsoft Xbox, who showcased how storytelling and gamification can be used to create innovative, engaging, and effective learning programs that generate measurable results.”

The second day of the conference opened with an address by Phil Ashford, Director at Enterprise Exchange Ltd and a specialist on delivering start-up advice to people with additional barriers. His talk, Developing Augmented and Virtual Reality in Training Adults from Underrepresented Groups, demonstrated how using immersive technologies in training has been instrumental in turning ex-prisoners into entrepreneurs.

Along with the excellent keynote addresses, a total of 55 contributions to the e-Learning landscape were presented during the conference, generating lively debate among delegates about the future directions of e-Learning. Additionally, the eighth e-Learning Excellence Awards recognised the year’s most innovative examples of e-learning – including an award for a Brighton and Sussex Medical School-developed online learning resource, Capsule, which has also been rolled out for free to Ukrainian medical schools.

The conference also provided an opportunity for MSc User Experience Design students to gain first-hand experience of participating in a peer-reviewed conference supporting their studies on the subject of Research Methods.

Published by

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *