Jerry Andriessen (1956)

Is Associate Professor at Utrecht University. His basic areas of research are argumentative writing, computer-supported collaborative learning and telelearning. In 1991, he received his Ph.D. from Utrecht University on collaborative writing. He was visiting professor at the University of Poitiers in 1996. He co-edited an international book on argumentative text production (1999), and is currently editing a book on arguing to learn in electronic environments. He currently coordinates a Ph.D. project on electronic collaborative writing, in addition a project funded by the Dutch National science foundation (NWO) on the role of the interface in electronic communication, and two projects financed by the European Union (5th framework) involving the construction of an Internet-based intelligent tool to Support Collaborative Argumentation-based Learning (SCALE and DUNES). Department of Educational Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands. Email:j.andriessen@fss.uu.nl

Henny P. A. Boshuizen (1950)

Is Professor of Education and Educational Technology at the Open University of the Netherlands, Educational Technology Expertise Center (OTEC), where she is responsible for the educational technology study programmes. She is the former director of the master degree program on Health Professions Education (MHPE), University of Maastricht. Her field of expertise is learning and expertise development in professional domains, including medicine, law, education, accountancy and business administration. Furthermore, she has done research on effects of activating educational strategies, such as problem-based learning. She studied psychology at the University of Amsterdam where she received her M.Sc. degree in 1979; her Ph.D. thesis dealt with development of expertise in medicine, University of Maastricht, 1989. Educational Technology Expertise Center, Open University of the Netherlands, PO Box 2960, 6401 DL Heerlen, the Netherlands. Email: els.boshuizen@ou.nl

Jan M. van Bruggen (1953)

Is an educational technologist at the Educational Technology Expertise Centre at the Open University of the Netherlands. His research interests are in the areas of computer supported collaborative learning using external representations of argumentation and computer supported essay rating. Educational Technology Expertise Center, Open University of the Netherlands, PO Box 2960, 6401 DL Heerlen, the Netherlands.
Email: jan.vanbruggen@ou.nl

Simon Buckingham Shum (1967)

Is a Senior Lecturer at the Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK. His research focuses on technologies to assist collective sensemaking, and covers applications such as collaborative learning, group memory capture, and scholarly publishing and discourse. He received his B.Sc. in Psychology at the University of York (1984), an M.Sc. in Ergonomics from University College London (1988), and a Ph.D. from the University of York (1991). His dissertation analysed the cognitive affordances of graphical argumentation schemes in the context of software design rationale capture. Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK. Email: sbs@acm.org

Chad S. Carr (1971)

Is Curriculum Development Manager for Sears, Roebuck and Co. He has engaged in research at Arthur Andersen, Northern Illinois University (as Assistant Professor), Educational Technology Expertise Center (OTEC) at the Open University of the Netherlands (as Research Fellow) and Pennsylvania State University (as Research Assistant). His research has focused on using networked computer applications to support argumentation in Legal Education. He received his B.A. in Biology from West Virginia University (1993), M.A. in Secondary Education from West Virginia University (1995) and Ph.D. in Instructional Systems from The Pennsylvania State University (2000). Sears, Roebuck and Co., 3333 Beverly Road, Hoffman Estates, IL 60179. Email: ccarr3@sears.com

Jeff Conklin (1951)

Is Director of CogNexus Institute, an independent consulting and research firm in Edgewater, Maryland, USA, and an adjunct professor in the School of Public Policy at George Mason University, Virginia, USA. He created the “Dialog Mapping” technique, which he employs with his consulting clients, and which he teaches in tutorials and workshops. His research focuses on collaborative tools for groups working on ill-structured problems. He received a B.A. from Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and a M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts. His dissertation was on the role of visual salience in the natural and automatic generation of natural language descriptions of pictures. CogNexus Institute, 304 Arbutus Drive, Edgewater, Maryland 21037 USA. Email: jeff@cognexus.org

John Domingue (1961)

Is the Deputy Director of the Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK. His research covers the intersection of knowledge and user interface technologies. In particular his work focuses on how formal knowledge models can be collaboratively created and shared on the web, and how these models can be used to create semantic web services. He has applied his work in a wide range of domains including medical guidelines, engineering, and online shopping. He received his B.Sc. in Computer Science at the University of Warwick (1983) and a Ph.D. from the Open University (1987). His dissertation was on how automatic program debugging tools could support novice programmers. Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK.
Email: J.B.Domingue@open.ac.uk

Douglas C. Engelbart (1925)

Is Director of the Bootstrap Institute and a Board Member of the Bootstrap Alliance, both USA. His primary focus is on launching a scalable model for the “Facilitated Evolution” of Collective IQ within and among a wide variety of organizations and their improvement communities. Early application of such improvements is aimed specifically at improving the improvement capabilities of improvement communities and of their component organizations, – the base of an explicitly cultivated “bootstrapping” strategy. His driving goal is to boost society’s collective capability for coping with its complex, urgent problems. He received his B.S. in EE from Oregon State University (1948), and his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley (1956). Bootstrap Alliance, 6505 Kaiser Drive, Fremont, CA 94555 USA. Email: dengelbart@yahoo.com

Gijsbert Erkens (1949)

Is Associate Professor at the Department of Educational Sciences at Utrecht University (the Netherlands) since 1984. He received his M.Sc. in Developmental Psychology at the University of Amsterdam, and a Ph.D. in Social Sciences from Utrecht University (1997). His dissertation was on computer-supported cooperative problem solving in education. He is now involved in research on computer-assisted collaboration, dialogue in learning, and argumentative writing. He is project leader of the COSAR and PRO-ICT research projects. Department of Educational Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Email: g.erkens@fss.uu.nl

Tim van Gelder (1962)

Is Associate Professor (Principal Fellow) in the Department of Philosophy, University of Melbourne, Australia, and director of the Australian Thinking Skills Institute (Austhink). He received a B.A. in Philosophy at the University of Melbourne (1984), and a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh (1989). His dissertation was on forms of representation and how knowledge is encoded in the mind and brain. After working for a number of years in the philosophical foundations of cognitive science, his interests have turned in an applied direction, particularly reasoning skill acquisition and intelligence augmentation.
Department of Philosophy, University of Melbourne, Australia and Austhink. Email: tgelder@ariel.ucs.unimelb.edu.au

Robert E. Horn (1933)

Is a visiting scholar at the Program on People, Computers, and Design of the Center for the Study of Language and Information at Stanford University and Distinguished Consulting Faculty member of the Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center. In 2000 he received the Diana Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of Computing Machinery SIGDOC for his work on the Information Mapping method and visual language. He has taught graduate courses at Columbia, Harvard and Sheffield universities. His most recently published book is Visual Language: Global Communication for the 21st Century (www.macrovu.com). He is a fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science. He is a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and a recipient of the Outstanding Research Award from the National Society for Performance and Instruction (NSPI). Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University, USA and Saybrook Graduate School, USA. Email: hornbob@earthlink.net

Jos Jaspers (1956)

Is Assistant Professor at the Department of Educational Sciences at Utrecht University (the Netherlands) since 1991. He received his M.Sc. in Psychology in 1991 from Utrecht University. He now teaches courses on information technology in education and is involved in research on computer-supported collaborative writing. He wrote the TC3 groupware for the COSAR project and is currently working on the more exhaustive program VCRI for the PRO-ICT research project. Department of Educational Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands. Email: j.jaspers@fss.uu.nl

Gellof Kanselaar (1942)

Is Full Professor in educational psychology and ICT in education at Utrecht University since 1988. He received his Ph.D. in experimental psychology at Utrecht University in 1983. He is director of the institute for educational research (ICO-ISOR) at the University of Utrecht. He co-ordinates several research projects on the use of computers in education and on Computer supported Collaborative Learning, funded by the Dutch National Science Foundation (NWO). He has also served as president of the Dutch Educational Research Association and member of the Board of the Institute for Educational Research in the Netherlands. He was member of the scientific committee of the European CSCL-conference in Maastricht in 2001. Department of Educational Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands. Email: g.kanselaar@fss.uu.nl

Paul A. Kirschner (1951)

Is Professor of Educational Technology at the Educational Technology Expertise Center (OTEC) at the Open University of the Netherlands and Professor of Contact and Distance Education at the Faculty of General Sciences/Knowledge Engineering at Maastricht University. He has held the IBM-Learning Chair (International Chair in Computer Science) on the University of Gent, Belgium and is a member of the Educational Council of the Netherlands, the advisory board for the Dutch Minister of Education. He received his B.A. in Psychology and Education at the State University of New York at Stony Brook (1973), a M.A. in Educational Psychology at the University of Amsterdam (1978) and a Ph.D. from the Open University of the Netherlands (1991). His dissertation was on the use of practicals in higher science education for the achievement of complex cognitive skills.
Educational Technology Expertise Center, Open University of the Netherlands, PO Box 2960, 6401 DL Heerlen, the Netherlands. Email: paul.kirschner@ou.nl

Gangmin Li (1964)

Is a Research Fellow at the Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK. His research focuses on agent technologies to assist organisational knowledge management. He received his B.Sc. in Software Engineering at the Northwest Polytechnic University, China (1983), an M.Sc. in Computing from University of York (1995), and a Ph.D. from the Open University (1998). His dissertation proposed a novel multi-agent cooperation method called “Shifting Matrix Management” for multiple autonomous agents to achieve a common social benefit. Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK. Email: G.Li@open.ac.uk

Enrico Motta (1961)

Is the Director of the Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK. Dr Motta has a Degree in Computer Science from the University of Pisa, Italy, and a Ph.D. in Artificial Intelligence from the Open University. His main interest is in knowledge technologies and his current research focuses on the specification of reusable knowledge-based components (ontologies and problem solving methods), and the application of these technologies to support the creation and configuration of semantic web services, and to facilitate knowledge capture, sharing and publishing in organisations. He has authored a book entitled “Reusable Components for Knowledge Modelling” (IOS Press). Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK. Email: E.Motta@open.ac.uk

Maaike Prangsma (1974)

Is a Junior Researcher in the Department of Educational Sciences at Utrecht University (the Netherlands) since 2000. She received her M.A. in English and Linguistics at the University of Groningen (1999). Her Master’s thesis was on Second Language Acquisition. She is project manager for the COSAR and PRO-ICT research projects. Department of Educational Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands. Email: m.prangsma@fss.uu.nl

Albert M. Selvin (1959)

Is a Senior Manager in the Information Technology Group at Verizon Communications, USA, where he leads web design, software development and business process redesign teams. His research interests are helping groups understand and act from multiple perspectives in problem situations, which has touched on computer-supported collaborative work, knowledge management, hypertext, and collaborative sensemaking. He is lead architect of the Compendium approach and toolset and in that role has facilitated over 500 sessions for industry, academic, and public groups. He received his B.A. in Film/Video Studies at the University of Michigan (1982), and an M.A. in Communication Arts from the University of Wisconsin (1984). Verizon Communications, White Plains USA.
Email: albert.m.selvin@verizon.com

Victoria Uren (1967)

Is a Research Fellow at the Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK. Her research explores ontological and graph theoretic aspects of argumentation maps, and their application as practical discovery tools in digital information systems. She received a B.Sc. in Chemistry at University College Swansea (1988), an M.Sc. in Information Studies from the University of Sheffield (1990), and a Ph.D. from the University of Portsmouth (2001). Her dissertation concerned statistical learning of classes in textual information systems. Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK. Email: V.S.Uren@open.ac.uk

Arja Veerman (1969)

Is presently a researcher for TNO Human Factors Research Institute, department of Training and Instruction. She received her Ph.D. in 2000 from Utrecht University. Her Ph.D. research focused on academic students who engaged in authentic, ill-structured and complex learning activities in electronic, networked-based environments. The role of argumentation was studied in relationship to collaborative learning-in-process. Contextual features, such as the role of the tutor, task and instruction, effects of structured interaction at the user interface and interface design, were related to the outcomes. Her focus in the coming years will be on telelearning, web-based training and the application of agent technology in “I”-CSCL systems (Intelligent CSCL). Department of Training and instruction, TNO-Human Factors, Kampweg 5, 3769 ZG Soesterberg, The Netherlands. Email: arja@xs4all.nl