Meet our Conference Keynotes!
Wendy W. Murawski, Ph.D., MBA, MEd, EdS, is the Executive Director and Eisner Endowed Chair for the Center for Teaching and Learning at California State University, Northridge (CSUN), where she is also a professor in the Department of Special Education and the Director of SIMPACT Immersive Learning. Dr. Murawski is the national Past President of the Teacher Education Division (TED) of CEC and award-winning researcher, author, and educator, including Teacher Educator of the Year in California. Dr. Murawski is an internationally known speaker and frequently requested keynote speaker, presenting in Europe, Asia, Africa, and North America. She has published extensively around inclusive education, co-teaching, collaboration, and Universal Design for Learning, to include 19 books and numerous chapters, blogs, and peer-reviewed articles. She is the CEO of 2Teach Global (www.2TeachGlobal.com), an international educational consulting company dedicated to championing inclusive education around the world.
Dr. Lisa Dieker, is the Williamson Family Distinguished Professor of Special Education in the School of Education and Human Sciences at the University of Kansas (KU). She is the parent and sibling of people with disabilities. She serves as the Director of a Center in the Assessment and Achievement Institute called FLITE (flexible learning through innovations in teaching and education). Dr. Dieker’s research focuses on harnessing the power of teachers working across disciplines in inclusive settings, with her work focusing on teacher education, special education, and innovative uses of technology. Prior to KU she was a Pegasus Professor at the University of Central Florida where she served as the Lockheed Martin Eminent Scholar directing the Lockheed Martin/UCF Mathematics and Science Academy, which produced over 500 teacher leaders in STEM. She also served as the co-coordinator for the Ph.D. program in special education, advising over 100 students, including 22 doctoral students with disabilities and 34 scholars from culturally diverse backgrounds. In her role as Co-Director of the UCF Center for Research in Education Simulation Technology (CREST), she and two colleagues created a widely used tool to prepare teachers and leaders using a mixed reality simulator called TeachLivE, now commercialized by Mursion. She is currently at KU and co-leads two U.S. Department of Education Office of Special Education Stepping Up grants to create a data tagging tool and to harvest resources to support STEM coaches working with special education teachers. The second project, in partnership with a public charter school district, is creating an AI agent combined with biometrics to support students with disabilities in STEM. She has managed over 60 grants from state, local, national, international, and foundation sources amounting to more than $25M. She has provided over 150 keynotes, produced 7 books, over 100 articles and chapters, and has served as an editor for 4 journals in the field. She holds 6 patents in simulation and education. She has served as the national conference Co-Chair for the Council for Exceptional Children and in an elected position on the Innovation and Technology Committee for the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education and on 8 journal review boards. She has been awarded the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC): Children Advocacy Network Advocate of the Year Award, the CEC: Teacher Education Division (TED) Outstanding Service Award, the CEC: TED Outstanding Journal Article Award, the UCF Graduate Student Mentor of the Year Award, and the University of Illinois and Eastern Illinois University Outstanding Alumni of the Year Awards.
