Call for papers

We are increasingly no longer in a world where digital technology and media is separate, virtual, ‘other’ to a ‘natural’ human and social life, and education is often at the forefront of these trends. Communities and research approaches engaged with technology and education tend to view the research field as concerned with the ‘effects’ of digital media and other technologies on the existing activities of teaching and learning in education. This still assumes a clear division between an authentic educational practice and the imposition of an external, and novel, technology. The rapid growth of research and books and articles dealing with education and research in and for the postdigital age calls for a different approach that is no longer based on a division but rather on an integration of education and technology. The postdigital approach meets that need.  

Selected participants will be invited to write up their presentation in their chosen format (a short commentary or a full article) to be considered for publication in the Springer peer-reviewed journal Postdigital Science and Education. 

We invite contributions from a wide range of postdigital research themes and approaches including but not limited to:  

• Postdigital theories and philosophies  
• Postdigital research methodologies 
• Education and automation 
• Big data and learning analytics
• Educational assessment
• Artificial Intelligences, neural networks, deep learning 
• Data, surveillance, and privacy 
• Networked learning     
• Postdigital mobilities 
• Postdigital (learning) spaces and places 
• Biopolitics and bioinformational capitalism 
• Biomodernity and viral modernity 
• Post-truth and fake news 
• Postdigital ecopedagogies
• Sustainability and bioeconomy
• Postdigital critical pedagogies
• Education and democracy  
• Postdigital literacies  
• Critical disability studies
• Decolonial, anti-imperialist, and anti-colonial studies and movements 
• Cultural and human geographies 
• Postdigital aesthetics and arts 
• Postdigital soundscapes (sonics, pedagogies, technologies) 
• Educational futures
• Responsible science communication

• do we know genZ? – how does genZ learn and develop skills? (lessons learned from Counterstrike, Minecraft, Fortnite, Instagram, Discord, Snapchat, Fiver and TikTok, etc. – how much do we know about genZ, how do they learn, what is important to them and what resources do we need to work and connect with them?) 
• innovative teaching and learning methods in HyFlex teaching, blended teaching, online teaching and classroom teaching 
• development of creativity, innovation and critical thinking and the role of digital technology 
• podcast as an educational tool and science promotion tool
• teaching towards sustainability 
• ordered chaos: security in virtual space – how safe are students in the virtual space and how do we educate them for the safe use of digital technologies? 
• consequences of hyperconnection & precarious world: digital dementia and/or digital awareness 
• learner/teacher autonomy – roles, identities, space and place 
• the role of space in education – a stimulating environment as an important factor in education
• creating knowledge by connecting/connecting by creating knowledge (learning communities) 
• digital addiction vs. functional use of technology 
• students as teachers 
•  the role of technology use in teaching students with special educational needs  (gifted, socially deprived, physically and cognitively impaired students, etc.)

• trends in the involvement of students in industry through internships, summer schools, job fairs, hackathons 
• learning through work, student perspective, usefulness of what was learned in formal settings vs. through work for future job 
• future jobs, problems of defining positions, interdisciplinarity, startups (e.g. field engineer, research manager, cloud broker, etc. 
• students’ interests and startup trends
• how to start, how to survive, how to advise new generations of students to start their own startups

• time management in the postdigital age: work-life balance (constant teacher availability, need for a structured accessibility) – examples of good practice 
• post-COVID era – lessons learned in the application of digital technologies, sustainability of changes and impact on the resilience of the education system as a whole
• competencies of educators, principals and professional services for the integration of digital technologies (initial education, professional development, informal learning, work-based learning) 
• how to integrate and teach migrant students (students from Ukraine and other war-torn areas)? 
• trust in the postdigital world: how much do we trust technology? how do we build relationships in schools with the help of technology vs. despite the technology? the role of trust in non-formal and informal forms of learning?

• school/university openness towards/in the local community – examples of good practice and the role of technology 
• school/university openness towards/in the global community (mobility) & the role of technology 
• internal and external school openness (within the school/university and outside the school/university) using technology 
• open channels in education (from primary to higher education) 
• application of current scientific knowledge in teaching and its results / examples (science in teaching)
• scientific knowledge based on research in teaching (teaching in science) 
• open education 
• open science 
• open educational content 
• open code
• open data 

• who has access to – education, tools, data, codes, space, etc. 
• FAIR data – Findable, Accessible, Interoperable & Reusable
• educating students on data management (who has access to our personal data and what is it used for (AI)), digital footprint – examples of good practice 
• the use of open data in student education (whether students use data for their own education, whether they know how to recognize data, etc.) 
• how much access do we have to data from different systems and whether we use them to improve the work of our students and educational institutions we run 
• access to data vs. usefulness of the data 
• what can we do to make access to the data we have more open? (as individuals or institutions)
• management of school sustainability data, potential of school energy consumption data for the purposes of student education

• how does technology help us ‌work with students with special educational needs (students with disabilities and gifted students) 
• technology as an obstacle in working with students and students with special educational needs and how can we overcome these obstacles?
• accessibility of schools and universities – real and virtual (assistive technologies) 
• advantages and challenges of using assistive technologies when working with pupils and students with special educational needs and/or disabilities 
• experience in applying new technologies (eg. virtual and augmented reality, 3D printing, artificial intelligence, robotics, etc.) in order to improve social inclusion 
• assisted communication in education (with the use of assistive technology) 
• digital accessibility (websites, mobile applications, and digital documents) and accessible environment. Digital division and digital inclusion

• IT services and support for schools and universities 
• platform support systems (MS Office365…) 
• working in the cloud – challenges and solutions
• Wordpress  
• security as a horizontal topic – about security for different user groups 
• tool quality assurance and sustainability 
• AI as a support and collaborator in learning and teaching 
• AI as a distorted picture of reality
• reception and adaptation of AI in education

• How to strategically lead digital maturity in educational institutions? 
• How are educational institutions going through digital transformation?
• What competencies are needed for digital maturity (leadership competences, pedagogical, technical and other competences)? Which ones exist, and which ones are missing, how to acquire them? How do we share knowledge and best practices? 
• What is the role of the principal, the teacher, and the student? Do parents and the local community play a role in the digital maturity of the school? 
• What support do schools need in digital maturity? 
• What support do colleges need in digital maturity? 
• (technical, pedagogical, or organizational support, something completely different?)
• What is the role of cyber security in digital maturity?

Suggest your own panel and speakers. The topic should be related to education and technology. Each panel can have three to five speakers.