Dr. Kristopher Alexander | Director/Professor of Video Games, Virtual Production, & Esports Broadcasting, The Digital Citadel/ Toronto Metropolitan University

Dr. Kris Alexander, the professor of video games, is a two-time globally ranked player turned scholar, and game developer. His work focuses on video game design, virtual production, and collegiate esports infrastructure.

As Director of The Digital Citadel, his work focuses on the ‘present’ of engaging educational content via hybrid instruction – engaging online instruction and live in-person expertise.

Dr. Alexander has also completed academic video essays with Wisecrack, a YouTube channel with over 3 million subscribers, done educational work with Epic Games, the Canada Media Fund, and work on esports in academia with Red Bull, and Team Liquid. He is Canada’s academic expert guide to the nuanced nature of video games that extend beyond the playing of games.

Dr. Alexander is also the director of The Conduit, a research lab at Toronto Metropolitan University, where he continues to transform education at the post-secondary level via partnerships and tangible output.

Aaditya Vaze | XR Researcher,ACE Lab at OCAD University

Aaditya designs systems and interactions for XR workspaces as a Researcher @ ACE Lab, OCAD University. He has an academic background in Computer Science and Mathematics and is a self-taught designer. He loves designing experiences for Mixed Reality among his other interests in UX, Branding, and Mobile app development. He is pursuing a master’s in design in Digital Futures from OCAD University and exploring the techniques to use context-aware systems to align educational concepts with the learner through the use of mixed-reality.

Julie Smithson | Co-Founder, MetaVRse

Julie Smithson’s personal mission is to ‘inspire and educate people to think and act in a socially, economically and environmentally responsible way using immersive technologies’.

It is through this lens as co-founder at MetaVRse, a 3D Web game engine for Business & XR development company. Julie is leading enterprise companies to digitally transform and educate ways to immersive and remotely train users of the product/service. Julie guides her team to translate instructional language, interaction behaviors and curate knowledge testing gamification for businesses.

Keram Malicki-Sanchez | Moderator