Contributing Authors

Mohamed Ally, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor in the Centre for Distance Education at Athabasca University. He teaches courses in distance education and is involved with research on improving design, development, delivery, and support in distance education.

Vincent Ambrock works as a Multimedia Instructional Design Editor in the Athabasca University School of Business. He holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree from the University of Alberta and has worked extensively as an editor and writer on an array of electronic and print-based publishing projects.

Terry Anderson, Ph.D. (terrya@athabascau.ca), is a professor and Canada Research Chair in Distance Education at Athabasca University, Canada's Open University. He has published widely in the area of distance education and educational technology and has recently co-authored two new books: Anderson and Kanuka, (2002), eResearch: Methods, Issues and Strategies; and Garrison and Anderson, (2002), Online Learning in the 21st Century: A Framework for Research and Practice.

David Annand, Ed.D., M.B.A., C.A., is the Director of the School of Business at Athabasca University. His research interests include the educational applications of computer-based instruction and computer-mediated communications to distance learning, and the effects of online learning on the organization of distance-based universities.

Dean Caplan is an instructional designer at Bow Valley College in Calgary, Alberta, with a special interest in the design, development, usability, and usage of multimedia in computer-mediated communications. He was, until 2002, employed as an instructional designer at Athabasca University. Mr. Caplan recently designed and oversaw development of a Web-based course helping older adults learn to use the Internet.

Lori-Ann Claerhout (loriannc@athabascau.ca) is Copyright Officer in Educational Media Development at Athabasca University. She holds a Bachelor of Arts (English) degree from the University of Calgary, and is currently working toward a Master of Arts (Humanities Computing and English) degree from the University of Alberta. Lori-Ann has been active in organizing other copyright professionals from western and central Canada.

Alan Davis, Ph.D., was Vice-President, Academic, at Athabasca University from 1996 to 2003, and before that he directed programs at the BC Open University. His original discipline was Chemistry, and he received his doctorate from Simon Fraser University in 1980. He has special interests learning assessment and accreditation, the management of e-learning, and virtual university consortia. Dr. Davis is now Vice-President, Academic, at Niagara College.

Fathi Elloumi, Ph.D. (fathie@athabascau.ca), is an associate professor of Managerial Accounting at Athabasca University. His research focuses on corporate governance, and covers all aspects of effective governance practices. He is also interested in the strategic and managerial aspects of online learning research from two perspectives. The first perspective deals with the strategic decisions of online learning, trying to use the value chain, balanced scorecard, and performance dashboard frameworks to optimize online learning decision initiatives and tie them to organizational vision. The second perspective deals with the operational aspects of online learning and mainly focuses on the internal processes of the online learning institution. Subjects such as strategic costing, value chain analysis, process re-engineering, activity-based management, continuous improvement, value engineering, and quality control are the focus of his research program related to online learning.

Patrick J. Fahy, Ph.D. (patf@athabascau.ca), is an associate professor in the Centre for Distance Education (CDE), Athabasca University. His career has included high school and adult education teaching, and research from basic literacy to graduate levels, private sector management and training experience, and private consulting. Currently, in addition to developing and teaching educational technology courses in the Master of Distance Education (MDE) program, Pat coordinates the MDE's Advanced Graduate Diploma in Distance Education (Technology) program and the CDE's annual Distance Education Technology Symposium. He is Past-President of the Alberta Distance Education and Training Association (ADETA). His current research interests include measures of efficiency in online and technology-based training, and interaction analysis in online conferencing.

Colleen Huber has worked at Athabasca University since 1994, when she was the first facilitator in the Call Centre. Since then, she has moved to the position of Learning Systems Manager where she is responsible for the systems used to deliver courses and manage information within the School of Business at Athabasca University. Now that these systems are available, Colleen spends a great deal of time presenting them to the Athabasca University community and running workshops to train staff on their use, as well as presenting papers and workshops to other educational communities.

Judith Hughes, Ph.D. (judithh@athabascau.ca), Vice-President, Academic, first came to Athabasca University in 1985, when the University was moved from Edmonton, Alberta, to the town of Athabasca, 120 km north of Edmonton. Judith's history is rooted in adult education, in teaching and research, as well as administrative positions. She has lived in a variety of places in Canada, having completed her bachelor's degree at Carleton University (Ottawa), her master's degree at Queen's University (Kingston), and her Ph.D. at University of Alberta (Emonton).

At Athabasca University, Dr. Hughes oversees all graduate and undergraduate academic units within the University, including academic centres, library, educational media development, counseling and advising, and other student support units. She previously served as Vice-President, Students Services, at Athabasca University for seven years, overseeing the development of student support resources on the Web.

Dr. Hughes also served as Vice-President, External Relations for a brief period, when she was responsible for executive communications outside the University, international collaborations, university development, fundraising, corporate partnerships, etc.

Dr. Hughes's research interests include the school-to-work nexus, in which she conducted research at Queen's University in the 1980s; access to university education, in which she first undertook research at the University of Alberta, and in which she continues to work at Athabasca University; intellectual honesty as institutional culture, in which she is now working at Athabasca University; and the use of technology in addressing equality of access to university education, in which she is conducting research with partners from institutions such as Indira Gandhi University and the University of the Arctic.

Deborah C. Hurst, Ph.D. (deborahh@athabascau.ca), is an Associate Professor with the Centre for Innovative Management, Athabasca University in Alberta, Canada. Her area of specialization is the study of cultural organization change, with an interest in knowledge work and development of intellectual capital through on-going competency development and virtual learning. Her work is a balance of applied and academic research that draws from a diverse background in her pursuit of this specialization. Her current research program is concerned the experiences of contingent knowledge workers, the development, retention and valuation of intellectual capital, the use of virtual learning environments to enhance intellectual capital, transmission and alignment of cultural values, and the de-institutionalization of the psychological employment contract. For more information regarding Deborah's work or background check the Athabasca University Centre for Innovative Management Web site.

Kay Johnson (kayj@athabascau.ca) is Head, Reference and Circulation Services at the Athabasca University Library. Kay received her Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in History from University of Ottawa and her Master of Library and Information Studies from McGill University. In addition to providing reference and instructional services to Athabasca University learners, she has been actively involved in the development of the digital library at Athabasca University, and serves as a consultant for the Digital Reading Room project.

Kerri Michalczuk has been with Athabasca University since 1984. For the last five years, as Course Production and Delivery Manager, she has managed the day-to-day operation of the School of Business tutorial Call Centre—the first point of contact for students registered in business courses. Kerri also manages the production processes for developing online and print-based materials, including coordinating the work of production staff, such as editors, instructional designers, typesetters, and copyright personnel. Kerri has extensive knowledge of Athabasca University's administrative and production systems, and she sits on many committees that review, plan, and implement University systems.

Joram Ngwenya, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Management Information Systems at Athabasca University. His research interests include e-learning systems, e-government systems, and group decision support systems.

Nancy Parker, Ph.D. (nancyp@athabascau.ca), is the Director of Institutional Studies at Athabasca University and is actively engaged in a wide range of quality assurance and accreditation activities, including serving on Alberta Learning's Performance Measurement and Management Information Committee, and as Athabasca's institutional liaison officer to the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. She has published in the fields of criminal justice history and institutional research.

Jan Thiessen is a Multimedia Instructional Design Editor in Athabasca University's School of Business. She received a Bachelor of Education degree (English) from the University of Alberta, and Master of Distance Education from Athabasca University. Her research on faculty attitudes towards interaction in distance education helps inform her work with course authors and teams, developing quality distance learning materials and experiences.

Janice Thomas, Ph.D. (janicet@athabascau.ca), is an Associate Professor and Program Director for the Executive MBA in Project Management at the Centre for Innovative Management, Athabasca University in Alberta, Canada. She is also an adjunct professor in the University of Calgary joint Engineering and Management Project Management Specialization, and a visiting professor with the University of Technology, Sydney, where she supervises Master and Ph.D. research students. Prior to becoming an academic, Janice spent ten years as a project manager in the fields of Information Technology and Organizational Change. Janice is now an active researcher presenting and publishing her research to academic and practitioner audiences at various sites around the world. Janice's research interests include organizational change, project management, team building and leadership, complexity theory in relation to organizations, the professionalization of knowledge workers, and the impact of codification of knowledge on performance. Ultimately all of her research is aimed at improving the practice of project management in organizations. For more information regarding Janice's work or background check the Athabasca University Centre for Innovative Management Web site.

Tony Tin (tonyt@athabascau.ca) is the Electronic Resources Librarian at Athabasca University Library. Tony holds a B.A. and M.A. in History from McGill University and a B.Ed. and M.L.S. from the University of Alberta. He maintains the Athabasca University Library's Web site and online resources, and is the Digital Reading Room project leader.

Houda Trabelsi (houdat@athabascau.ca) is an e-Commerce course coordinator at Athabasca University. She received a M.Sc. in business administration from Sherbrooke University and a M.Sc. in information technology from Moncton University. Her research interests include electronic commerce, business models, e-learning strategy, customer relationships management, trust and privacy in electronic commerce, World Wide Web navigation, and interface design.

Zengxiang (Eric) Wang, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of finance at Athabasca University. His research interests are option pricing, executive compensation, corporate tax planning, and online financial education.

Andrew Woudstra, Ph.D., Professor, Management Accounting is a member of the School of Business at Athabasca University where he has worked for the past 22 years. In addition to his teaching duties, he has also served the University in various administrative capacities including Centre Chair, Associate Dean, Acting Dean and Acting Vice President, Finance and Administration. Andrew has been involved in a number of innovative process changes in the School of Business, including the development of e-learning and the School of Business Call Centre, and has published in a variety of distance education journals and books.

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