Alison is a current PhD candidate and also a Digital Learning Designer with CDU. Alison has a broad range of experience and skills with e-learning, innovative educational technologies and learning design gained through 20+ years in education-related roles in tertiary education, government, and private sector. Alison has a Degree in Science, Graduate Diploma in Further Education and Training, and Master of Education degree. She also has extensive experience with Open Educational Resources (OER) and was the project lead and concept designer for a series of Massive Open Online Courses (2013-2018) developed through CDU’s Innovative Media Production Studio. Alison was the Manager and design lead for a busy Innovative Resource Development Studio at CDU for 8 years and undertook a w ide variety of educational design and learning resource development projects, including game-based learning, digital badges, OER strategy and implementing Pressbooks (ebooks), a platform for open textbooks. As an emerging SoTL scholar, Alison has authored and co-developed a large number of ebooks in Pressbooks as well as co-published 9 academic publications, including book chapters and a Q1 journal paper.

Alison has been the recipient of several awards including the 2020 Australian Awards for University Teaching Citation for outstanding contributions to student learning as part of the Academic Integrity Resource Development Team. Alison’s interest for the granular approach to enhancing learning was ignited through her early work on learning objects in her Masters degree. Alison’s continued dedication to enhancing the learning experience and advancing affordable learning options has led her to explore microlearning, and combine this with the opportunities and benefits of Open Educational Practice.