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Prof. Matar Mbaye
Dean of SCBS
South Champagne Business School
Troyes, France
Dean of South Champagne Business School (SCBS) in Troyes, Dr. Matar MBAYE is a sociologist whose work explores the structural transformations driven by digital innovation in education. Formerly a consultant and academic, he has consistently worked at the crossroads of change management, pedagogy, and institutional strategy. Guided by the belief that “the only tradition worth having is that of change,” he promotes nevertheless a humanistic vision of higher education that reconciles innovation with meaning, and performance with purpose. His leadership aims to align technology, organisational evolution, and the transformative mission of learning.
Matar Mbaye
Plenary Session
Artificial Intelligence as a mirror in abyme: rethinking learning, recognition, and the ontology of the human
This invited lecture examines artificial intelligence as a mirror in abyme—a recursive reflection of human cognition, culture, and social organisation. Drawing on the work of classical and contemporary thinkers such as M. Mauss, P. Bourdieu, C. Castoriadis and E. Morin, it presents AI as a fait social total that reshapes not only the production of knowledge but also the symbolic frameworks underpinning recognition, learning, and institutional legitimacy. In doing so, it raises essential questions about the future of education.
The talk examines three major areas of tension. The first concerns the diminishing role of imagination and the loss of the “invisible” dimensions of human experience—such as emotion, poetic invention, and interpretive nuance—within learning environments that are increasingly data-driven and optimised. The second relates to the sociological divides and cultural marginalisations embedded in algorithmic systems, which call into question the presumed universality of AI and its tendency to produce a global homogenisation of ways of knowing. The third addresses the reconfiguration of certification, validation, and qualification frameworks at a moment when automated processes play a growing role in determining recognition and assessment.
By re-opening the ontological dialogue between human beings and existence, the intervention proposes a renewed understanding of learning as a dia-poetic journey—creative, relational, and irreducible to optimisation. It argues that the future of education and knowledge will depend less on the computational power of machines than on humanity’s capacity to preserve imagination, symbolic mediation, and the ethical discernment that give meaning to intelligence.
Renitha Rampersad
Prof. Renitha Rampersad
Assistant Dean: Research and Innovation
Faculty of Business and Management Sciences
Cape Peninsula University of Technology
Cape Town, South Africa
Professor Renitha Rampersad has a DPhil from the University of Zululand, in South Africa. She is the Assistant Dean of Research and Innovation in the Faculty of Business and Management Sciences at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. Her research on transformation in business, digitalisation, work integrated learning and women mentorship has contributed to co-edited books and authored chapters in journals. She is involved in national and international funded research projects. She leads a multidisciplinary project on transformation of the socio-economic environment which aligns with digitalisation and infrastructural challenges with BRICS countries.
Plenary Session
Reimagining the University: Past Lessons, Current Realities, Future Directions
The future of higher education demands that universities innovate by achieving a critical balance.
The traditional educational model has adapted to accommodate flexible learning arrangements in the post-pandemic world. Due to this higher education has had to adjust to an increasingly uncertain and complex future. These challenges include external pressures, such as globalization, and internal pressures, such as a decrease in funding and blended learning approaches. ED4.0 has placed a strong emphasis on cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset and fostering innovation among learners, achieved through project-based learning, internships, and exposure to real-world problem-solving scenarios. The realisation of ED4.0 depends on contextual variables, resource availability, and institutional priorities, with ongoing developments in technology and education likely to enhance or introduce new trends.
Given that learning journeys are entirely flexible and customizable, universities must remain relevant and must reinvent themselves by adapting and delivering through hybrid models that accommodate both synchronous and asynchronous learning.
This article through a descriptive paradigm will reflect not just what the future may hold, but potentially deeper changes in the relationship between universities and their past, present, and future.
Prof. Selver Softic
Full Professor, Department of IT & Business Informatics,
CAMPUS 02 University of Applied Sciences
Graz, Austria
Selver Softic is a full professor specialising in, information processing, data mining and data visualisation, as well application of AI in education and process management. He has extensive experience in digital learning innovation, leading activities in Erasmus+ projects such as Gate2Math and AI-Greener and coordinating international teaching initiatives. His current research and teaching focus includes the integration of AI into higher education, learning analytics, and educational data mining.
Selver Softic
Plenary Session
Human-Centered Learning Analytics in Education
This talk explores how Artificial Intelligence can make learning analytics more human-centered in STEAM education. Moving beyond grades and system logs, it highlights how AI can capture engagement, motivation, and sentiment to provide adaptive feedback and empower both students and teachers. The session outlines a visionary roadmap for using learning analytics to enrich the student experience and build bridges across STEAM disciplines.
Workshop proposals can be submitted until the end of 2025, by email, with all the necessary information, as:
Tittle, Abstract with clear objectives and promoters Short Bio and Affiliation.
The proposals will be analysed by the Conference Organizers and the acceptance will be transmitted before the end of January 2026.
Please, notice that workshop promoters must be registered in IDEAS'26 before April 14th.
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