Sean Hickey is a doctoral student in Learning Technologies at The Ohio State University. Hickey received his B.S. in Biology from The Ohio State University in 1998. After graduation, he worked as a curriculum developer and program director at the Center of Science and Industry, a science museum in Columbus, Ohio. Hickey later moved on to McGraw-Hill Education, where he developed print and digital instructional materials while simultaneously earning his M.A. in Integrated Teaching and Learning from The Ohio State University.

He currently works at Ohio State’s Center on Education and Training for Employment (CETE) as Lead Curriculum Developer. As part of his role, he facilitates item-writing workshops for statewide career-tech end-of-course tests and industry credentialing exams and develops eLearning materials for teachers and subject-matter experts.

An award-winning instructional designer, he is active in the learning-technologies community and has presented at several conferences related to both EdTech/learning technology and learning and development. Most recently, he has presented at the Future of Educational Technology Conference (FETC), the Ohio Educational Technology Conference (OETC), the eLearning Guild Learning Solutions Conference (LSCon), and OSU’s own Innovate conference, on topics such as assessment strategies, gamification, branching learning scenarios, and inquiry education.

Among his many eLearning projects, Hickey created a software-training game for users of CETE’s WebXam testing system. The game won the “Seasoned Professional” division of Central Ohio ATD’s Look & Learn event. He was also co-creator of an eLearning game about writing multiple-choice test items, called “Multiple-Choice Mayhem,” which was recognized by the Association for Educational Communications & Technology (AECT) as a 2019 Outstanding Digital Learning Artifact and received “Best in Show” at the 2019 Learning Solutions Conference (LSCon) DemoFest.

As part of the research group, Hickey plans to study critical-thinking and non-cognitive skills and how they can be developed or enhanced using technology. He is also currently researching how augmented reality and virtual reality can be used in career-technical education for both training and assessment.

The LED research group welcomes Fan Xu this semester. Fan is a graduate from the University of Hong Kong and a first-year doctoral student in Education, specialization in Learning Technologies at The Ohio State University. She loves sharing her life on social media platform and there are 300,000 Chinese people are watching her Vlog.

Fan received her B. S. in Educational Technology from Shanghai Normal University, China in 2017. She then pursued a M.S. in Information Technology in Education at The University of Hong Kong, specializing in Learning Design Technology. She has contributed to the data analysis of several University of Hong Kong Small Private Online Courses by working as a research assistant at Technology-Enriched Learning Initiative. While studying in Hong Kong, she worked as an instructional designer at a local company that focused on e-learning design and development of Mandarin courses for French adult learners. She also designed and developed online training courses by cooperating with local universities and insurance companies. She has a great passion for optimizing e-learning design to engage and motivate adult learners.

After earning her master’s degree, Fan worked at Southern University of Science and Technology in China where she was involved in several academic projects initiated by the International Centre for Higher Education Innovation under the auspices of UNESCO. During that time, she became interested in MOOC design and assessment in higher education contexts, and she is excited about MOOCs teaching potential, particularly in developing countries.

Chenxi Liu is a doctoral student in Education, specializing in Learning Technologies at The Ohio State University. Liu holds a B.A. in Radio and TV Editing and Directing from Zhejiang University of Media and Communications in China, and an M.A. in Curriculum and Teaching from Bowling Green State University.

Liu has worked as a Chinese language teacher, program co-founder, curriculum developer, and instructional designer. She has also worked in the media industry as a TV director and editor in the field of children’s education & development. Her working experience includes local schools, online learning organizations, and TV & Film.

Driven by her work experience and educational background, Liu desires to explore innovative strategies to promote learners’ motivation and engagement and help them to reach their full potential as 21st-century learners. She wishes to fuse research and practice in educational settings. Utilizing data and cognitive science, she aims to design and develop connected digital learning systems that support learners in various educational pursuits.

Liu’s current research interests include online and mobile learning, collaborative learning, learning design and evaluation, learning experience design, educational technology design and production, and learning analytics and modeling.

The project that Liu is currently working on as part of the LED research group aims to explore learning experience design strategies to improve students’ engagement in mobile-computer-supported collaborative learning.