Keynote Speakers
Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of ABET U.S.A. Michael K. J. Milligan is the Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of ABET, the global accreditor of over 4,000 college and university programs in applied and natural science, computing, engineering, and engineering technology. Prior to joining ABET in 2009, Milligan was a systems director at the Aerospace Corporation, leading a team at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center developing the next generation environmental satellites for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Milligan served over 24 years as a career U.S. Air Force officer working in operations, education, international research, and development. During his USAF career, he served as an associate professor and deputy department head in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado. Milligan earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin, his M.S.E. from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, and his B.S. from Michigan State University — all in electrical engineering. He also earned an M.B.A. from Western New England College, is a registered Professional Engineer (PE) in Colorado and Maryland, and a Certified Association Executive (CAE).
CEO of Quanser CANADA As the CEO of Quanser since 2002, Paul Gilbert oversees the strategic development of solutions geared towards improving the quality of engineering education and research in the global academic community. Paul is passionate about bringing hands-on experiments into universities, enabling students to gain real world experience and graduate as the strongest and most influential generation of engineering leaders. Paul regularly travels around the world delivering keynote presentations and meeting with senior engineering educators. He is also as an active participant with global academic leadership organizations, including IFEES, GEDC, WEEF, IUCEE, and ASEE. Paul has over two decades as a CEO or President in SME companies in North America, with global experience in Business Development. He brings wealth of international experience developing global partner relationships and major R&D oriented projects in the packaging, aerospace and energy management sectors. Paul holds an MBA from the Richard Ivey School of Business in Canada as well as a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering from the University of Southampton, U.K. In addition to his day job, Paul has been an active youth mentor in a number of programs designed to develop young minds and promote STEM education. Currently he is active with the NEXT 36 Entrepreneurial Development program. Paul is also an avid cyclist and together with his team has raised over $250,000 for the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre in the last 5 years with the Ride to Conquer Cancer.
President European University Association (EUA) Ireland
Michael Murphy is President of the European University Association. A past President of University College Cork, Ireland (2007-17), he has been active in many academic organizations in Europe and the United States and has served as Vice-Chancellor of the National University of Ireland, Chair of the Health Research Board of Ireland, Chair of the Irish Universities Association and Chair of the Permanent Working Group (PWG) of European Hospital Doctors. Currently, he chairs the Steering Committee of the European Learning and Teaching Forum and the Advisory Board of U-Multirank.
President of IFEES U.S.A. Dr. Stephanie Farrell is the President of the International Federation of Electrical Engineering Societies. She has served as the Interim Dean of the Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering at Rowan University and Professor and Founding Chair of the Department of Experiential Engineering Education (ExEEd). Stephanie began her career as a faculty member in the Chemical Engineering Department at Louisiana Tech University. She joined Rowan as a founding faculty member of the Chemical Engineering Department in 1998, where she served until launching ExEEd in 2016. Stephanie is past president of the American Society for Engineering Education, and she has served two terms on the IFEES Executive Committee. For the last decade, she has been actively involved in the Indo-US Collaboration for Engineering Education, serving as an international partner, teaching certification cluster leader, and IFEES representative. Stephanie leads Rowan’s Revolutionizing Engineering Diversity organizational change initiative, funded through NSF’s Revolutionizing Engineering Departments (RED) Program. She is on Rowan’s ADVANCE team for organizational change to promote intersectional gender equity in STEM, and she leads ASEE’s national initiative to promote LGBTQ+ inclusion in engineering, both funded by NSF. Stephanie’s contributions to engineering education have been recognized with numerous national and international awards. She has been honored by the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) with several teaching awards such as the National Outstanding Teaching Medal and the Quinn Award for experiential learning. She received the highest award from the International Society for Engineering Pedagogy (IGIP), the Nikola Tesla Award for outstanding achievements in engineering pedagogy. She received AIChE’s national award for Service to Chemical Engineering Education. Stephanie was the 2014-2015 Fulbright Scholar in Engineering Education at Dublin Institute of Technology (Ireland).
Global Engineering Deans Council (GEDC) Chair South Africa Dr Sunil Maharaj is the Chair of the Global Engineering Deans Council. He has been a Professor and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology (EBIT) at the University of Pretoria (UP) in South Africa since 2014. He received his BScEng (Electronic Engineering) from University of Natal, South Africa, MSc in Operational Telecommunications, Coventry University, UK and a PhD in electronic engineering specializing in wireless communications from the University of Pretoria. He is registered with the Engineering Council of South Africa as a professional engineer with the title PrEng. Dr Sunil Maharaj is also the SENTECH Chair in Broadband Wireless Multimedia Communications at UP. He is also a Fellow of the South African Academy of Engineering, Fellow of the South Africa South African Institute of Electrical Engineers (SAIEE) and SMIEEE. Currently he is also the Deputy President of the South African Institute of Electrical Engineers (SAIEE) with a membership of more than 5000. He started his career as a Microwave and RF Design Engineer in 1989 and then worked at the Eastern Cape Technikon in South Africa before joining the University of Pretoria in 2000. Prior to becoming Dean he was Head of Department of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering at UP. He has 31 years of industry, academia, consulting and research experience. Dr Sunil Maharaj has over 145 peer reviewed full conference papers and journal articles published and holds 2 international patents all in the area of wireless communications. His research interests are in OFDM-MIMO systems, Massive MIMO technology, cognitive radio resource allocation and 5G cognitive radio sensor networks. He has spent time doing research at Vienna University of Technology, Brigham Young University, USA and Stevens Institute of Technology, USA and had various collaborative research activities with colleagues in Argentina, Canada, Tunisia, USA and Sweden. Dr Maharaj was instrumental in 2017 in establishing a non-profit company owned by the University of Pretoria called TuksNovation NPC, which is a hi-tech incubator and accelerator supporting student and faculty business startups. TuksNovation has received significant funding and support from the South African government and corporate sector in South Africa and is making significant impact in the country. He joined as a GEDC member in 2014 and had the privilege through your support to be elected to serve on the GEDC Executive Board since 2018. Dr Sunil Maharaj is also involved with the African Engineering Deans Council through working with other fellow Deans in supporting engineering education and research through the development of online webinars and collaboration. He is the General Conference Chair for the 2020 WEEF and GEDC Conference that will be held online for the first time from 16-19 November 2020.
Secretary General Magna Charta Observatory (MCO) United Kingdom David Lock is the Secretary General of the Magna Charta Observatory. He has had a varied career in international higher education and university leadership. As Director of International Projects at the UK’s Leadership Foundation for Higher Education, Lock was responsible for instigating and delivering projects with over 30 different countries, some at Governmental level. Projects have included major programmes for Rectors and Ministry Officials to implement national HE reforms and autonomy strategies over several years and building partnerships between universities in different countries. Until October 2007, Lock was the founding Registrar and Acting Chief Executive of the British University in Dubai where he structured, built, and then led the University following its legal creation by the Ruler of Dubai as a not-for-profit provider of Higher Education to UK standards. Prior to going to Dubai, Lock was Secretary to the University of Huddersfield and Registrar and Secretary to the University of Hull in the UK for a total of 14 years. A teacher and Chartered Secretary by background, Lock has served on several international bodies and undertaken a range of consultancy assignments including international development and UK HE governance projects. He is Chairman of the Gulf Education Conference and serves on the International Advisory Committee of the British Council. He has been appointed Secretary General of the Magna Charta Observatory in September 2014.
Executive Secretary General Global Engineering Deans Council (GEDC) U.S.A. Dr. Hans Jürgen Hoyer serves as the Executive Secretary of the Global Engineering Deans Council (GEDC) and the Secretary General of the International Federation of Engineering Education Societies (IFEES). Additionally, Dr. Hoyer is a Resident Scholar in Global Engineering at the Volgenau School of Engineering at George Mason University, Global Visiting Professor at the University of Maryland BC, and co-founder of the Indo-Universal Collaboration for Engineering Education (IUCEE). Dr. Hoyer initially became involved with IFEES and the GEDC when he served as the Director of International Programs and Strategy for the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE). He is co-founder and advisor of the African, Asian and Latin American Engineering Deans Councils; works closely with over fifty engineering education societies globally and enjoys a close partnership with the World Bank in regard to their activities in Africa; with UNESCO where he serves on their Advisory Council; and also the OAS. He also works in close partnerships with over 18 international, multi-national corporations including Airbus; Boeing; Siemens; Dassault Systemes; Mathworks; Quanser; Liaison; Ansys-Granta; Phoenix. Prior to 2006, Hans J. Hoyer was CEO of World Links, a spin-off of the World Bank. In this capacity, he worked globally on issues related to secondary education, teachers’ education, and on-line collaborative learning focusing on science; IT and social studies among high school students across the globe. Dr. Hoyer has led several international development programs, including CARE, Plan International, and Heifer International. In these latter roles, he held executive leadership positions such as Senior Vice President/Chief Operating Officer, and Regional Executive and was responsible, among others, for a large number of staff and for raising financial resources from a multitude of donors including government agencies, the World Bank, OAS, UNESCO, several foundations, corporations and private donors. He also represented the largest U.S. farming membership association as a spokesperson at the European Union and European Parliament in Brussels and also represented them in Mexico and Central America. Dr. Hoyer has served with Nelson Mandela on the board of directors of El Taller, a global civil society network headquartered in Tunisia as well as on several social-action community groups. He was also on the staff of the Inter American Foundation, created by the U.S. Congress to support socio-economic development throughout Latin America/Caribbean. He was on Hewlett Packard’s e-Inclusion Global advisory board related to their scientific and engineering work in South Africa and founding member of the Board of the Engineering for the Americas (EftA) initiative under the umbrella of the OAS. He currently serves as an Advisory board member in UNITAR (United Nations) Division of Prosperity), on the Governing Board of the International Center for Engineering Education/UNESCO/ Tsinghua University; Strategic Advisory Board of UNESCO’s second Ten Year Report on Global Engineering; as co-founder and Advisory Board member of the Indo-Universal Collaboration for Engineering Education (IUCEE) and Information Technology in Higher Education and Training (ITHET); and Global Advisor to SUSTech, Shenzhen, China and Beihang University School of Engineering, China. He is the co-founder of SPEED, a global engineering student organization that conducts engineering student capacity building worldwide. He has been, continues to be a keynote speaker for conferences globally focusing on engineering education and capacity building. Dr. Hoyer has been a Visiting Scholar at the Center for International Studies at MIT, a Fellow at Harvard’s School of Education and visitor at the Kennedy School of Government. He was dean of the graduate program at the School for International Training, World Learning and Executive Director of the Executive Training Program for global governmental and NGO leaders in Brattleboro, Vermont. He also taught at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia and Montgomery College, Maryland, USA. Presently, he is an Honorary Professor at universities in Hungary, India, Kazakhstan and Peru. Born in Germany, he immigrated to the United States of America as a teenager. He earned his Ph.D. at American University in Washington, D.C. As a post-doctoral fellow with the Organization of American States (OAS), Dr. Hoyer carried out research in the Rio de la Plata region of South America. He started his career as a Peace Corps Volunteer and high school teacher in Linares and Talca, Chile and has lived in over twenty countries including India, Sri Lanka, Chile, Peru, Brazil, Ecuador, Paraguay, Argentina, Mexico, South Asia, Belgium, Kenya and Zimbabwe. Over his extensive career he has visited 152 countries, is fluent in four languages and conversant in additional five languages. Each of his four children was born in a different country. He has written and published on a broad range of subjects related to engineering education; international development, strategic planning; politics, health, and education.
Dean, Tecnológico de Monterrey Mexico Dr. Jaime Bonilla Rios has developed a successful academic and policy career at Tecnológico de Monterrey, an Institution with Campuses throughout México, and international presence in different Latin American countries and the United States. Currently, Dr. Bonilla is Dean of the School of Engineering and Information Technology at Campus Monterrey. Dr. Bonilla served as Director of the Office of Alumni Relations and the Career Center. Among other positions at Monterrey Tech, Dr. Bonilla has been a Director for the Chemistry Program in Campus Monterrey and Director of Research and Continuing Studies. He conducts research in the Center for Innovation in Design and Technology. He is a Visiting Professor at Rice University in Houston, Texas. Dr. Bonilla has worked in consulting for major companies and institutions in Mexico and the United States, including Hylsamex Nemak, U.S. Motors, Glass Monterrey, Alkali Industries, Manufacturing and Industrial Processes, CYDSA, TOTAL Petrochemicals, and others. He has been a member of the Chemical Society of Mexico, Society of Plastics Engineers, and the Society of Rheology, among others. He was also President of the Association of Programs EXATEC of Chemical Sciences; Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the XXXII, XXXIII, and XXXIV Research Congress at Tecnológico de Monterrey; and a member of the Review Committee for FOMIX Project (Joint Funds of the Government of Nuevo León State). As teacher, researcher, and scientist Dr. Bonilla has focused on the generation of knowledge in his specialty areas, he has worked in collaboration with other researchers, and he has been advising master and doctoral theses students. In this way, he has been Senior Adviser to 17 master’s theses, a dissertation, and has published articles in conference proceedings and international journals. He has also collaborated with other research activities in other institutions, such as the Center for Applied Chemistry (Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico); Rice University; Technical University of Hamburg in Hamburg, Germany; and Johannes Kepler University in Linz, Austria. Dr. Jaime Bonilla Rios has a B.S. in chemistry, from ITESM, Campus Monterrey. An M.S. in chemical engineering from Rice University, and a Ph.D. in interdisciplinary engineering with emphasis on polymer rheology from the Texas A & M University.
Ardiana Sokoli
Vice President, Real Estate & Hospitality and Board Member of Balfin Group
Albania
Responsible for overall Real Estate investments of the Group. Direct supervising RE and hospitality segment; Managing a portfolio of more than Euro 1 billion (being that in residential and hospitality) Outstanding management and executive experience in Banking, Financial Management and Risk Advisory services and Governance. Whilst deeply rooted in the banking and financial sector, has worked intensively with both private and the public sector, be that in the form investments, of shares acquisition or privatization or management consulting. Involved since in the early years with management of foreign aid, donor coordination and projects. Always trying to keep a position that utilizes her management and financial background, leadership, and interpersonal skills in a challenging environment.
Ledia Telhai Chief Executive Director, Real Estate & Hospitality of Balfin Group Albania Ledia Telhai is currently the Executive Director for Balfin Real Estate & Hospitality. More than ten years of experience as CEO, in various companies of the Balfin group. Experienced Chief Executive Director with a demonstrated history of working in the retail and real estate industry. Strong business development professional skilled in Strategy formulation and execution, Purchasing, Marketing Management, Hospitality management, Asset and Property management, Negotiation, Budgeting, Business Planning, Sales and Team Management. Highly skilled and results-oriented professional. Proven ability to assess and manage complex obstacles; Successful in intense and demanding environments, providing decisive team leadership and structure with a track record of motivating and developing employees.
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