Presentation Title - The Global Open Education Resources Movement : Potential Contributions from Africa
(Chair, Pan-African Forum on OER )
Workshop Host
Dr. Moustapha Diack is affiliated with the doctoral program in Science/Mathematics Education (SMED) at Southern University in Baton Rouge (SUBR).   He is president of the Louisiana Academy of Sciences and represents Louisiana to MERLOT and the Southern Regional Education Board’s Searchable Content Repository for Education (SCORE). He is member of the Advisory Board of elearning Africa and an active member of the UNESCO Community of Interest on OER. Diack is the Project Director of the MERLOT Africa Network (MAN). His research interests are in the areas of Open Education Resources (OER), ICT transfer to Africa, and instructional multimedia design and assessment.

Presentation Title - how to ensure an active participation of African academics in the adoption and dissemination of OER
(Local Program Chair)
Dr. Bakary Diallo is currently Rector of the African Virtual University (AVU), an Intergovernmental Organization based in Nairobi Kenya and specialized in Open Distance and Electronic Learning. He has been working in the education sector for the last 19 years as a secondary school teacher, an academic, a consultant, a project administrator and a researcher. He assumed part-time lecturer at the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Education in Canada and served as Consultant of Integration of ICT in Education at the Center for University Teaching. His research activities focus on the use of ICT in higher education and international development.

Presentation Title - Use of OER in Africa:  Possibilities and constraints
Mr. Musa Sowe is a lecturer at The University of The Gambia. He is currently pursuing a PhD degree in chemistry, partly with a view to setting up remote experiments on-line for access by institutions of learning.  He has served as distance education coordinator for the republic of Gambia for 7 years and is the country’s focal point for the Commonwealth of Learning (COL).  He has participated in numerous inter-African and other international conferences and workshops on distance education and open educational resources (OER).  He has served as consultant for UNESCO, COL, UNICEF among others.  In 2004, Mr Sowe founded the Maths, Science and Technology Centre in The Gambia, an organization with the objective of providing quality ICT and science education to the youth and especially to those disadvantaged in these areas.

Dr. Gerry Hanley is Executive Director of MERLOT and Senior Director for Academic Technology Services for the California State University. At MERLOT, he directs the development, delivery, and sustainability of MERLOT's organization and services to enhance teaching and learning with academic technologies. At the CSU, Gerry oversees the development and implementation of integrated electronic library resources and academic technology initiatives supporting CSU's 23 campuses. He is also the Director of the Center for Usability in Design and Assessment (CUDA) at the California State University, Long Beach. Previously held positions in the CSU include Professor of Psychology, Director of Faculty Development and Director of Strategic Planning. He received his degrees from SUNY at Stony Brook in experimental psychology.

Program Chair
Workshop Host
Dr. Solomon Negash is an assistant professor of information systems at the college of science and mathematics, Kennesaw State University. He coordinates the information systems program. His research focus is on information and communication technology and access for developing economies. He has received awards including international goodwill, distinguished graduate teacher, and distinguished elearning professor. His community service is focused on education for Africa, open education resource in particular, under the umbrella of a charitable organization, Bethany, he founded in 2001.

Chair MANeLA Awards
Workshop Host
Dr. Laura L. Franklin is a Professor of French at Northern Virginia Community College in Alexandria, Virginia.  She is the current Vice Chair of the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages and elected Chair for 2009. She was awarded in 2003 the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia Outstanding Faculty award. She is co-Editor of the World Languages collection of the Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching (MERLOT). Research interests Of Dr. Franklin have included the internationalization of the curriculum, the affordances of the Open Educational Resource Movement, the role of community colleges in World Languages nationwide, and the growing need for the expansion of critical language programs.