A space for national and international dialogue around experiences and research that address and generate knowledge about the impact of digital technologies and media on gender equality and women’s well-being.
I decided to focus the plenary on a discussion about a forthcoming book that my colleagues and I co-editing titled Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online. With that in mind, I invited several of the book chapter authors to join the plenary session and together we embarked on a wonderful journey!
Our plenary is titled: “Critical Conversations in Online Education: a Deep Dive into the Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online Book”. You can watch the plenary presentation on YouTube:
Presenters: Niya Bond (University of Maine): Using Feminist Pedagogy to (Re)Imagine Online Classrooms (Introduction)
Bridget Kriner (Cuyoga Community College): Building Participatory Spaces in Online Classrooms (Chapter 5)
Katina Rogers is the editors of the special issue titled : “On Gathering: Exploring Collective and Embodied Modes of Scholarly Communication and Publishing” published in the Journal of Electronic Publishing.
This issue is an exploration of the ephemeral—the stray thoughts, the side conversations, the discarded scraps and false starts that inform a published work of scholarship, usually invisibly. In putting together this collection of work, I wanted to make these traces the focal point, since so much of our actual thinking takes place in spaces of indeterminacy and interpersonal connection. – Katina Rogers
You can read Katina’s full editorial here:
Rogers, K. L., (2025) “Editor’s Gloss: The Process of Shared Knowledge Creation”, The Journal of Electronic Publishing 28(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.6835
As part of this wonderful special issue, my colleagues and I published a long overdue autoethnography title: “A Feminist Scholars Collective Supporting the Growth and Dissemination of a Digital Guide: A Collaborative Autoethnography“
This paper explores our experiences as scholars in higher education who collaborate as part of an informal collective supporting the Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online digital guide[1]. We, the authors, have diverse professional and educational backgrounds; our areas of research interest also vary significantly. However, we have a passion for humanizing online learning experiences and practically applying feminist pedagogical tenets to these interactions. The purpose of this paper is to explore, through a process of self-reflection, our experiences as scholars in higher education as part of an informal collective supporting the Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online digital guide. To share our experiences as editors of this digital guide, we included our individual stories using a collaborative autoethnography approach. In our stories, we specifically discussed our interest in joining this collective of feminist scholars, the evolving nature of our efforts in support of the digital guide, the success experienced, the challenges that we encountered, and the internal and external support we received throughout this journey. Ideally, through this critical reflection, we can aid other collectives who already engage, or are considering engaging, in similar scholarly communication endeavors. – Romero-Hall et al., 2025
You can read out journal article here (it is available open access):
Romero-Hall, E., Daniel, C., Howard, J. T., Bond, N. & Newman, L., (2025) “A Feminist Scholars Collective Supporting the Growth and Dissemination of a Digital Guide: A Collaborative Autoethnography”, The Journal of Electronic Publishing 28(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.5878
I also want to say thank you to our wonderful special issue editor, Katina Rogers who hosted a virtual roundtable to highlight all the authors and journal articles published in the special issue. Here is the recording of the virtual roundtable:
This is a 2024 year in review post but focused on publications. These are my 2024 publications:
Gomez-Vasquez, L., Ozi Dias Da Silva, C., Fortsmane, L. & Romero-Hall, E. (2024). Leveraging Connections in Social Media Hashtag Communities: Uses, Gratifications, and Strategies. Journal of Interactive Learning Research, 35(2), 195-221. Waynesville, NC: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE). Retrieved July 31, 2024 from https://www.learntechlib.org/primary/p/223892/
Yang, H. & Romero-Hall, E. (2024). A Pilot Study Exploring Interaction and Student Satisfaction in Asynchronous Courses in Higher Education. TechTrends.https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-024-00986-7
Gomez-Vasquez L., Forstmane L., Dias Da Silva C. O., & Romero-Hall E. (2024). Personal branding strategies in online hashtag communities: the case of #AcademicTwitter. Research in Learning Technology, 32. doi.org/10.25304/rlt.v32.3098
Romero-Hall, E., Gomez-Vasquez, L., Forstman, L., Ripine, C. & da Silva, C.D. (2024). “Visibility, transparency, feedback and recognition”: Higher Education Scholars’ Using Digital Social Networks. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 2024(1): 7, pp. 1–15. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/jime.842
Allen, T., Villaflor-Wilson, R., Muljana, P.S. & Romero-Hall, E. (2024). AI-generated content: Guidelines, higher order thinking skills, and copyrights. Educational Technology Journal, 4(1), 1 – 5. https://journal.unesa.ac.id/index.php/etj/article/view/27840
Carpenter, J., Rosenberg, J., Kessler, A., Romero-Hall, E. & Fischer, C. (2024). The importance of context in teacher educators’ professional digital competence. Teachers and Teaching: Theory and Practice. https://doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2024.2320155
Romero-Hall, E. (2024). Suzie Beckett and Adam McSweeny: Developing a Role-Playing Simulation. In In P. Ertmer, K. Glazewski, A. Koehler & J. Stefaniak (Eds.), Instructional Design Casebook (6th ed.). Routledge.
My professional experiences are so much more than a list of publications but it is important to acknowledge this work because it took time, effort, energy, mentoring, and collaboration.
The SIG Instructional Technology (IT) will once again offer Travel Scholarships to the top 10 proposals where a graduate student is the first author. The SIG Instructional Technology Graduate Student Travel Scholarship aims to alleviate the cost of attending the AERA 2025 Annual Meeting. More importantly, it serves as an honor for us to recognize these emerging scholars.
The following graduate students were (1) selected as recipients, (2) accepted the scholarship, and (3) submitted the required information:
Congratulations to all the SIG Instructional Technology Graduate Student Travel Scholarship recipients!
This seems like the perfect time to come back to write a blog post again, after recently returning from the 2024 AECT International Convention. I am worried that if I share everything that I want to share, this blog post would be super lengthy. So, I going to do my best to it keep short and sweet!
I first joined AECT in 2009 and that year I attended my first AECT conference. I had ZERO funds to attend the conference but a classmates of mine offered to let me crash in her hotel (at no extra cost) and share her per diem with me (our plan was to live off pizza for a a few days). The organization she worked for was paying for her trip and she wanted to support me. I am never going to forget that. Thank you Dr. Sonya Bland-Williams!
Back to #AECT24.
This year the AECT International Convention was special in many ways. First, the conference was returning to Kansas City. A place that is very special to my heart:
In the spirit of sharing stories, which is the theme of AECT 2024, I thought I would share a short but special story with all of you: Exactly twenty years ago, I embarked in my higher education studies in the United States. I was accepted into an International Business program at Emporia State University in Emporia, KS. I left the safety of home and started my own journey. The first stop on that journey was Kansas City and very specifically this hotel, The Kansas City Marriott Downtown. So, in many ways, getting to do this AECT keynote here, in Kansas City and in this hotel, feels to me like I have come full circle. So, for that I am very thankful!
Also, conferences in Kansas City are wonderful opportunity to meet with my college roommate, Mikelle. There is something about sharing a college dorm with someone else, you either become really close or you may never want to see each other again. Mikelle and I have been friends from the moment we met, 20 years ago! She is such a kind soul! Her and her family were so incredible welcoming of me when I was in college. Mikelle was living in the dorm just for fun, because her family actually lived in our college town. So I was able to spend time with them (her family) regularly!
Another aspect that made this conference so special was that I was attending #AECT24 with my doctoral advisees: Wei Wang, Ashley King, and Yuexin (Jennifer) Duan. We have been working on projects for some time but we were finally able to start sharing some of the findings from our research with the AECT community this year. Wei is a force to be reckoned with! He is making moves as a researcher and a graduate assistant for the Digital Learning team at UTK. This year, Wei and his colleagues from Digital Learning presented “Implementing Generative AI in Practice: Designing Assessments and Learning Activities in Faculty Development Programs“. This work focuses on professional development that Digital Learning has been doing in the UTK campus to engage in conversations with faculty about the use of generative AI in higher education and its implications.
Ashley and Jennifer presented on a “work in progress project”. As a research team, we have been working a on a range of different systematic reviews. The project that Ashley and Jennifer shared related to “small group dynamics in asynchronous online learning”. The presentation primarily focused on the introduction of the topic up until the process of analysis of the journal articles for inclusion in the systematic review. We will continue to move forward with data extraction and the remainder of the process. Also, quick shout to all the members of our team who were not able to attend but have worked with us on this project!
The best way I can describe this experience is that: I am a proud advisor and that I am lucky to work with such an amazing team!
Then there is Dr. Lucy Santos Green! What else do I need to say! Lucy is the mastermind behind this project called “Online Ready”. Long story short, Online Ready is a federally funded project that aims to equips school librarians to deploy effective practices for culturally competent and inclusive K-12 online instruction. Having Lucy at AECT to speak about this project with me, was definitely a highlight! We have been working on this project for the last 3 years virtually and getting to see her and feed off her energy is just so amazing! Here are our slides. Our presentation at AECT 2024 focused on the implementation of Online Ready with school librarian with the goal of receiving feedback during Summer 2023. Online Ready will be available open access for anyone to use and share by next spring! More on this coming soon!
This is getting long! Yikes!
This year, it was such a humbling experience to also be the closing keynote for the conference. When the organizer of AECT 2024, Drs. Tonia Dousay, Tutaleni Asino, andRebecca Reese reach out early this year, I was so incredibly honored! I know that we have a wide range of colleagues who are doing impactful work, so it meant a lot to be considered for this role. What made it even more special was that a dear friend and colleague was also going to be a keynote speaker, Dr. George Veletsianos. George’s keynote, as expected “delivered”! It already had a major impact on my advisees and their career goals. So, I am very grateful for his message!
Technology, Imagination, and Education Futures: Education systems worldwide face profound economic, demographic, political, environmental, and social challenges. Traditionally, our field has responded by either embracing the latest technological advancements or striving to make instruction more effective, efficient, and engaging. However, these approaches are not enough. They are limiting and insufficient. They constrain our imagination and curtail our ability to create better educational futures for ourselves, our students, and our societies. In this talk, I will explore how speculative methods can offer creative, exploratory, and fruitful ways to examine, produce, and rethink the learning environments we are developing and supporting.
As George’s colleague, Dr. Bruna Damiana Heisfeld mentioned: “great minds think alike.” Because both keynote discussed how we can move forward as a field considering ways in which we can humanize learning design research and practice. Here are the slides from my closing keynote and my abstract:
(Re)Igniting Empowered Actions: Over the last few years, we have seen many political, social, and educational shifts that have impacted how we live, work, and learn. We have also experienced a global pandemic that changed us. In many ways we have spent a great deal of time simply surviving. All of these experiences have shaped who we are as individuals, but also as learning designers, educators, and researchers. Today, as we move forward, it is even more important than ever before that we critically reignite our purpose with empowered actions. This talk reflects on why and how we connect with the world around us in intentional empathetic ways that at the core aim to humanize learning design practice and the use of emerging technologies in education. Let’s tap into the power of our stories to share the narratives that often go untold. For good reason, there is a strong focus on the reimagining of our educational futures. Yet, we need to be cognizant that our actions today already shape those visions of tomorrow. Today, equitable and ethical learning design practices and research are not just a “good idea,” they must be the norm. The reality is that efficient, effective, and engaging in not enough to fully capture the socio-cultural context of the world we live in.
Thank you AECT for such a memorable experience!
Also because I always take a million photos: Here you go! Also, thanks to those who shared photos with me!
Every year the College of Education, Health, and Human Services organizes a Graduate Student Research Colloquium. Of course, when the notification for the graduate colloquium was shared with faculty, I encouraged all the Learning, Design, and Technology (LDT) graduate students to submit their research to the colloquium. I was extremely excited to find out that three of our LDT students were accepted to present! Unfortunately one of the students was unable present due to another commitment. Ashley King and Wei Wang were there to share their projects with attendees of the colloquium.
Ashley King is a lecturer at University of Tennessee Knoxville in the College of Business. She is a LDT Ph.D. candidate. I am her advisor and dissertation chair. She is also a research team collaborator! Wei Wang is an LDT first year doctoral student and I serve as his co-advisor (along with Dr. Josh Rosenberg). He recently presented at AERA 2024 in one of the graduate students research-in-progress roundtables!
Session: “Politic Born of Necessity”: Latina and Latinx Feminists Remembering Genealogies, Imagining Futures
Lugones, Maria A. 2003. Peregrinajes/pilgrimages: Theorizing coalitions against multiple oppressions. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield. Google Scholar
Session: “Rupturing the White Gaze: Centering Chicana/Latina Feminista Methodologies and Epistemologies in Qualitative Research” Symposium Resources
Today I had the opportunity to participate in a panel presentation at the 2nd Annual XR Symposium organized by the Oak Ridge Enhanced Technology and Training Center (ORETTC). The specific panel that I was invited to join was focus on Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion specifically on Inclusive Technologies related to XR research & development.
The panel addressed the following questions:
What are some new advancements you have seen in regards to diversity and inclusion in XR?
What are some obstacles within XR technologies? What are the long-term consequences if we ignore D&I?
What would you say is the most difficult part of implementing D&I especially in a world that persistently changes?
In order to encourage accessible and inclusive practices within our workplace and everyday lives; how can we authentically address these topics?
Can you share some valuable resources that we should all be aware of?
It was a great conversation! I am specially gratefully for my fellow panelist and the insights shared:
Huge thanks to Mary Lin, Ed.D. (Senior Manager, Knowledge Acquisition and Performance Studies ) and Austin Arnwine (Instructional Technology Lead, Knowledge Acquisition and Performance Studies) for the invite to participate in the panel.
First and foremost, it has been a pleasure serving as the AERA SIG Instructional Technology Program Chair. Huge thanks to everyone who submitted proposals to our SIG. It was very exciting to see the range of topics covered in the proposals submitted. I was also deeply impressed with the quality of the proposal submitted, which made for a difficult peer review process for our reviewers. Speaking of reviewers! I am profoundly grateful for our 94 reviewers who took on the very meaningful tasks of providing feedback and recommending proposals for our SIG Instructional Technology program. Huge thanks to all that have volunteered as Session Chairs, you are a critical component for a smooth conference session! Gratitude!
I can humbly say that we have an amazing AERA 2024 program for the SIG! Each session was carefully designed to ideally create a cohesive line up of presentations. I look forward to meeting you in Philadelphia and to your presentations! I am excited for all of us to engage in academic discourse, professional development, and informal social conversations. See you soon! Go Vols!
Enilda Romero-Hall, Ph.D., Associate Professor, University of Tennessee Knoxville
These quote is a section of the AERA Special Interest Group Instructional Technology Spring 2024 Newsletter recently shared with our members. Below is a copy of the complete AERA Special Interest Group Instructional Technology Spring 2024 Newsletter compiled, formatted, & organized by the 2023-2024 board members of the SIG Instructional Technology:
Design Goodiness 
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