Speaker: Kate Beverage

Kate Beverage is the Assistant Director of the Academic Technology Center at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). Kate's primary responsibility is to lead the ATC's outreach efforts to the WPI community with regards to the use of instructional technologies in teaching and learning. She supports instructional technologies and other collaborative applications at WPI for use in campus-based, blended, and distance learning courses and has been working with faculty at WPI to explore other ways in which the tools can be used in a university environment. Kate holds a B.A. in Instructional Technologies from the University of Connecticut and a M.S.Ed. in Educational Technology from Boise State University.

Speaker: Tova Duby

Tova Duby is the Senior Manager, IT Operations at Babson College. Her focus is to manage central operations for the Operations and Security IT team at Babson. Tova leads application, project and change management for the group. She also provides root cause and risk analysis support along with acting as a liaison to the faculty and students to run critical system task forces. Tova has been part of the Babson community since 2001 and is a founding member of CITG – the Curriculum Innovation and Technology Group. Tova has played a major role in many of the innovative initiatives here at Babson such as the Alden Trust toolkits, FME redesign, WebSyl and Advanced Discussion Board tool development and Fast Track MBA design and launch. Her focus has been on creating solid learning experiences for faculty and students while infusing technology into teaching. In her previous roles as Senior Manager for Blended Learning Implementation, ePlatform manager and Instructional Technologist, Tova led many initiatives such as Blackboard upgrades, course site Wiki and Blog integration, Drupal learning tool development and implementation and many other learning tool implementations. Tova's background includes learning tool platform management, operations and project management, systems training, desktop support, and systems analysis. Tova holds an MBA from Clark University and a BS in business communication from Bentley College.

Speaker: Aaron Ferguson

Aaron Ferguson is the Director of the Office of Disability Services at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). Aaron is responsible for all permanent and temporary accommodations for students with medical, physical, psychological, developmental and learning disabilities. His role requires maintaining active, collaborative ties with Academic and Student Affairs departments to implement appropriate accommodations for students with disabilities as well as develop programming to educate the campus community about ableism and accessibility. Aaron holds a B.A. in Psychology and International Commerce from the University of Connecticut and a M.Ed. in Higher Education and Student Affairs Administration from the University of Vermont.

Speaker: Eric Palson

Eric Palson is the Director of Babson's Blended Learning team within IT. His group is responsible for instructional design, graphic and conceptual design, innovation, ideation, and benchmarking academic technologies for Babson College. Eric's areas of expertise include instructional design, program development, piloting and implementing new enterprise tools, user interface design, print design, marketing, and advertising. Before joining Babson College, he worked for a number of consulting and design firms, including Nextera Enterprises. Eric also co-founded the design firm Drive Thru Designs, where he is currently on the board of directors. In addition to his work at CITG, Eric is adjunct faculty member at Babson College as well as Suffolk University, where he teaches Web and graphic design. Eric holds a BA in advertising and graphic design from Loyola University in Maryland. He is also a recent graduate of Babson College where he earned an MBA in the Spring of 2009. His postgraduate studies also include media theory at Emerson College.

Speaker: Kristen Palson

Kristen Palson is the Associate Director of Simmons Online. Prior to coming to Simmons, she was the Assistant Director of Blended Learning at Babson College. At Babson, Ms. Palson partnered with leading-edge faculty and thought leaders to establish state-of-the-art course delivery for innovative online teaching in all blended offerings across the college with special focus on the blended Fast Track MBA program. In her role at Babson, she determined product positioning and communication plans for new learning technologies as they were introduced to faculty and students. She designed and developed training programs and materials to help users navigate the changes associated with using learning technologies and promoted the adoption of learning tools among faculty, students, and administration.Throughout her career, Ms. Palson has built and managed high performance teams of curriculum designers. Her leadership fosters the exploration of innovative ways to deliver learning for the next generation while balancing the strategic needs of the college, resources and growth. Ms. Palson taught design as an adjunct faculty member at Emerson College and Suffolk University and has spoken at national conferences including Organizational Behavior Teaching Conference and the Blackboard World Conference on the use of technology in education. Ms. Palson has a BFA in musical theater and directing from The Boston Conservatory and has over 15 years of professional acting and directing experience.