Keynote Speakers

Dr. Bettina Fuhrmann is  Professor of Business Education at Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU), and Head of the Institute for Business Education. 

Her main fields of research are economic education (with a special emphasis on financial education), instructional quality and evaluation as well as personal development. She is coordinator of various research projects on economic literacy and financial literacy and represents WU as an affiliate member of the OECD International Network on Financial Education (INFE).

Meidi Sirk, PhD, is Associate Professor of vocational education at the School of Educational Sciences, Tallinn University, Estonia. 

She is a member of the Vocational Teachers’ Professional Committee, Estonian Association for Advancement of Vocational Education, and member of European Research Network on Vocational Education and Training (VETNET) of European Educational Research Association (EERA). 

Her academic interests and research are related to changes in vocational education and vocational teachers’ professionality and didactics of vocational education and training.

Dr. Juergen Seifried has been a full professor of Economic and Business Education at the Business School of the University of Mannheim, Germany, since 2012. After studying business education at the University of Mannheim (1989-1994), completing his traineeship as a teacher at vocational schools (1994-1996) and teaching at a commercial school for three years (1996-1999), he began his academic work in 1999 (doctorate in 2004, habilitation in 2008, both at the University of Bamberg, Germany). From 2008 to 2012, he was professor of business and industrial education at the University of Konstanz, Germany. 

Juergen's research focuses on subject didactic issues, research on competence development of teachers and trainers, simulation-based learning, learning in the workplace, and methods of competence assessment in vocational education. His research findings are published in international journals, and he serves as an editorial board member and reviewer for various journals. His research has appeared in journals such as Frontiers in Psychology, Higher Education, and The Journal of Workplace Learning. He is a member of the editorial board of Vocations and Learning and co-editor of the German Journal Zeitschrift für Berufs- und Wirtschaftspädagogik. He is co-editor of the German Journal “Zeitschrift für Berufs- und Wirtschaftspädagogik”.

Philipp Gonon is a former Professor of Vocational Education and Training (VET) at the Zurich University, where he teached vocational pedagogy, history and theory of (vocational) education, quality assurance and program evaluation at the graduate and undergraduate level. From 1986 until 1992 he was research assistant and lecturer at the Institute of Pedagogy of the University of Bern, Switzerland where he finished his postdoctoral lecturer qualification (Habilitation) in 1997. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the Universities of Zurich and Berne respectively. From 1999 until 2004, Gonon served as a Full University Professor of Vocational and  Further Education at the University of Trier in Germany. From 2004-2021, he was appointed at the University of Zurich in order to build up an academic program for teacher training for VET schools. From 2016-2019 Philipp Gonon was the director of the Institute of Education. Since 2020 he is still a member of the Institute of Education and engaged in major research projects on VET transfer and for digitalization in VET and upper secondary schools. Internationally Philipp Gonon is known as an expert on the German dual apprenticeship model, the Swiss VET system, the German pedagogue, Georg Kerschensteiner and in the field of  international comparative education. He is the author of many scholarly publications.  One major publication in English is his book The Quest for Modern Vocational Education – Georg Kerschensteiner between Dewey, Weber and Simmel, an analysis of the development of the idea of apprenticeship in the twentieth century.  He is a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Vocational Education and Training and of Vocations and Learning.