50 Remarkable Thought Leaders in EdTech Australia NZ

Introduction

Every principal who has sat through a vendor demonstration promising that one platform will solve everything, and every university administrator who has approved an AI policy that was outdated before it was signed, knows the same truth: education technology is not a problem of access to tools. It is a problem of access to clear thinking. The Australian EdTech market reached approximately USD 4.2 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach USD 7.7 billion by 2034, according to the IMARC Group's 2025 market analysis. Australia alone has over 800 EdTech companies operating nationally as of January 2026. With that much activity, the voices that cut through noise with genuine insight are more valuable than ever.

This list brings together 50 thought leaders who are actively shaping how education technology is understood, applied, and challenged across Australia and New Zealand. They include researchers whose work influences national frameworks, classroom practitioners who build and test tools in real schools, founders who have built platforms used by millions of learners, and policy advocates who ensure that technology serves equity rather than eroding it. The list deliberately moves past the most frequently cited global names to surface the voices most directly embedded in the ANZ context.

For schools, universities, TAFE providers, and corporate learning teams navigating the rapid acceleration of AI, digital transformation, and platform proliferation, these are the people whose thinking is worth following in 2026. If you are building a team, shaping a strategy, or simply trying to understand what is actually working in EdTech right now, this list is your starting point.

If your organisation is looking for support with the leadership, team alignment, and people dimensions of navigating change during technology transformation, Jonno White, bestselling author of Step Up or Step Out and Certified Working Genius Facilitator, works with leadership teams across Australia, New Zealand, and globally. Email jonno@consultclarity.org.

Why Education Technology Matters in Australia and New Zealand

The scale of investment in EdTech across Australia and New Zealand is not the most important reason to pay attention to this field. The most important reason is that the decisions being made right now about how artificial intelligence, data analytics, digital platforms, and immersive technologies are used in classrooms and lecture theatres will shape learning outcomes for the next generation. And many of those decisions are being made without adequate access to independent, evidence-based thinking.

EdTech investment in Australia declined significantly in 2025, with funding dropping by over 67 percent according to January 2026 market reports, reflecting tighter capital conditions and a shift toward sustainable, outcome-driven business models. This correction is healthy, but it also means the gap between well-resourced institutions that can navigate EdTech decisions confidently and under-resourced schools and providers that cannot is widening. The thought leaders on this list are producing the kind of research, practitioner guidance, and policy advocacy that helps close that gap.

New Zealand faces its own distinct pressures. A smaller market, a unique bicultural education context, and tight integration with global platforms that are rarely designed with Maori or Pacific learner needs in mind create challenges that require locally grounded thinkers, not just technology imports. Several of the New Zealand voices on this list are building answers to those specific challenges.

If your leadership team is navigating a technology transformation and finding that the human side, specifically the change management, communication, and team alignment dimensions, is where the real friction lives, Jonno White provides facilitation and keynote services that specifically address these dynamics. Trusted by organisations around the world, Jonno works both virtually and face to face. Email jonno@consultclarity.org.

How This List Was Compiled

Every person on this list was selected on three criteria. First, they have made a substantive and documented contribution to education technology through research, practice, policy, or platform building that is specifically rooted in or directly relevant to the Australian or New Zealand context. Second, they are actively engaged in public conversations about EdTech in 2025 or 2026, whether through published research, conference presentations, public writing, or professional community leadership. Third, the list was deliberately built to surface voices that may not dominate global EdTech lists but are doing some of the most consequential work in the ANZ region.

The list spans researchers, classroom practitioners, founders, policy advocates, platform builders, and independent consultants across the full education spectrum: K-12, higher education, VET, and corporate learning. It acknowledges both the Australian and New Zealand contexts as distinct while recognising the many cross-Tasman connections that shape the regional ecosystem.

Category A: Artificial Intelligence and Learning Science Researchers

The most consequential EdTech thinking in Australia right now is happening in university research labs where learning scientists, data analysts, and AI researchers are asking hard questions about what generative AI actually does to learning, not just what it can do. These researchers are shaping national frameworks, informing government policy, and producing the evidence base that every practitioner and platform builder needs.

1. Jason Lodge

Jason Lodge is Principal Practitioner at the Generative AI Institute for Teaching and Learning Innovation and Professor in the School of Education at The University of Queensland. He brings an educational psychology lens to questions that most AI researchers ignore: when a student gets the right answer with an AI tool, have they actually learned anything? His work challenges the assumption that performance gains from generative AI translate automatically into durable learning.

In 2025, Lodge co-authored a paper with Lixiang Yan, Samuel Greiff, and Dragan Gasevic in Nature Reviews Psychology titled "Distinguishing performance gains from learning when using generative AI," which has become a foundational reference for educators and institutions trying to develop assessment frameworks that remain valid in an AI-saturated environment. His LinkedIn posts are among the most intellectually honest and practically useful contributions to the AI-in-education conversation in Australia.

2. Dragan Gasevic

Dragan Gasevic is Distinguished Professor of Learning Analytics and Director of the Centre for Learning Analytics at Monash University in Melbourne. He has been recognised as the national field leader in educational technology by The Australian newspaper consecutively from 2019 to 2025. With over 52,000 academic citations, he is one of the most influential learning analytics researchers anywhere in the world.

Gasevic co-authored the paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" published in Computers and Education: Artificial Intelligence in 2022 with Zachari Swiecki, Hassan Khosravi, Guanliang Chen, Roberto Martinez-Maldonado, Jason Lodge, Sandra Milligan, and Neil Selwyn, establishing a comprehensive framework for rethinking assessment design as AI changes what it means to demonstrate knowledge. His research group at Monash is producing work that directly informs Australian higher education AI policy.

3. Matt Bower

Matt Bower is Professor of Educational Technology in the School of Education at Macquarie University in Sydney. He was one of ten academics nationally invited to contribute to the Australian Framework for Generative AI in Schools, and he is ranked among the 25 most highly cited Australian researchers in the Education field according to the Elsevier-Stanford Top Scientists rankings. He has delivered over 70 keynote and invited speaker presentations internationally on AI in education, augmented reality, and technology-enhanced learning design.

Bower's 2026 book Creative Technologies Education, co-edited with Garry Falloon and published by Routledge, addresses the fundamental question of whether developing student creativity through hands-on technology projects remains important in an era when generative AI can produce sophisticated creative outputs from a simple text prompt. His answer is a carefully evidenced yes, with important qualifications about how educators need to redesign their approaches.

4. Roberto Martinez-Maldonado

Roberto Martinez-Maldonado is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash University and one of the leading international voices in human-centred learning analytics. His work specifically focuses on how learning analytics can support collaborative and team-based learning, using physical and digital data together to understand how groups of students work and learn in shared spaces.

Martinez-Maldonado's research on multimodal learning analytics provides some of the most practically applicable frameworks for institutions wanting to understand not just individual performance data but the relational and spatial dimensions of how learning happens. His LinkedIn posts regularly bridge complex research and practical implementation questions for educators and institutional designers.

5. Hassan Khosravi

Hassan Khosravi is Associate Professor in the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at The University of Queensland, where his research focuses on intelligent learning analytics dashboards and AI-powered feedback systems for students. He is one of the developers of the Intelligent Learning Analytics Dashboard system, which has been adopted by multiple Australian universities.

Khosravi was a co-author of the foundational 2022 paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" alongside Dragan Gasevic, Roberto Martinez-Maldonado, Jason Lodge, and others. His work on emotionally enriched AI feedback, published in Computers and Education in 2025, explores whether AI systems can deliver feedback that supports not just cognitive performance but student wellbeing, a question that is becoming increasingly urgent as Australian institutions scale AI-powered assessment tools.

6. Abelardo Pardo

Abelardo Pardo is Professor and Chair in Learning Analytics at the University of South Australia, where he specialises in using data from digital learning environments to personalise student feedback at scale. He is the lead developer of the OnTask tool, a widely used open-source platform that enables university teachers to use learning data to send personalised, actionable messages to students at key moments in their learning journey.

Pardo's work on personalised learning analytics support has demonstrated measurable improvements in student persistence and completion rates in large-scale university courses. His participation in the 2026 EDUtech Australia program and his ongoing research publications position him as one of the most practically influential learning analytics researchers in the country for higher education institutions.

7. Simon Buckingham Shum

Simon Buckingham Shum is Professor of Learning Informatics at the University of Technology Sydney and one of the founding figures of the learning analytics field internationally. He has contributed to some of the most influential conceptual frameworks in human-centred learning analytics, including work on sensemaking tools and the ethics of data-driven education.

Buckingham Shum co-authored the paper "Human-Centred Learning Analytics" in the Journal of Learning Analytics in 2019 with Rebecca Ferguson and Roberto Martinez-Maldonado, which remains a foundational text for researchers and practitioners designing analytics systems that centre learner agency rather than institutional surveillance. His continued work at UTS grounds international conceptual contributions in the Australian higher education context.

Category B: AI in Education Practitioners and Policy Advocates

Beyond the research labs, a critical group of practitioners and policy advocates are translating AI research into workable guidance for schools and institutions navigating the practical realities of generative AI in 2025 and 2026. These are the voices educators actually turn to when they need to know what to do on Monday morning.

8. Leon Furze

Leon Furze is a bestselling author, consultant, and PhD graduate from Deakin University based in Victoria. He completed his PhD in 2026, focused on the implications of generative AI for teachers of writing, making him one of the most rigorously credentialled practitioners in Australia on the specific question of what AI means for literacy, assessment, and writing pedagogy. His book Practical AI Strategies reached bestseller status and is widely used by Australian and international educators.

Furze's blog at leonfurze.com is one of the most widely read independent sources of AI-in-education analysis in Australia. His December 2025 post comparing Australia's Higher Education AI Framework with the K-12 Schools Framework identified critical gaps in the national policy approach to equity, Indigenous knowledges, and regulatory backing. He posts regularly on LinkedIn about AI governance, assessment design, and the practical realities of GenAI in classrooms.

9. Julian Ridden

Julian Ridden is Head of AI at The Anglican Schools Corporation in New South Wales, where he leads AI strategy across a network of more than 20,000 students. He is a sought-after speaker at major Australian education conferences, including EDUtech Australia 2026, known for his ability to demystify AI for educators and school leaders who are navigating implementation decisions without adequate guidance.

Ridden's work at The Anglican Schools Corporation represents one of the most serious and systematic attempts by any Australian school network to build AI capability at scale rather than through ad hoc tool adoption. His conference presentations consistently focus on the practical governance, professional learning, and pedagogical design decisions that determine whether AI integration serves students or simply adds complexity to already stretched teachers.

10. Sheridan Gentili

Sheridan Gentili is Director of the Teaching Innovation Unit at the University of South Australia, where she leads work on learning analytics, generative AI governance, and digital assessment design. She is a co-author on multiple learning analytics publications and a regular contributor to national conversations about AI policy in higher education.

Gentili's roundtable session at EDUtech Australia 2026 on government policies for generative AI in education specifically addresses how Australian universities should navigate regulatory requirements and emerging guidance frameworks. Her work at UniSA positions her as a bridge between academic research on learning analytics and the practical institutional implementation challenges that learning and teaching leaders face daily.

11. Mark Lamont

Mark Lamont is a senior figure in Australian EdTech who chairs a portfolio of well-known EdTech enterprises while leading innovation projects at the intersection of learning, teaching, AI, and human-centred design. He brings a rare combination of deep platform knowledge and genuine pedagogical commitment to conversations about where EdTech is heading.

Lamont's participation in EDUtech Australia 2026 as a speaker and strategic thinker reflects his standing in the Australian ecosystem as someone who understands both the commercial and educational dimensions of technology in schools and institutions. His work on EdTech governance and design ethics is increasingly relevant as Australian institutions grapple with procurement decisions that will shape learning experiences for years.

12. Ryan Elwell

Ryan Elwell is Director of Digital Pedagogies and Online Safety Education, working closely with educators, school leaders, parents, and students across Australia to improve how digital learning environments are designed and governed. He brings over two decades of classroom experience to his current system-level role and is a regular speaker at major Australian education events.

Elwell's 2026 presentation at the Generative AI for Education Leaders Summit focused on human-centred AI integration, arguing that AI tools in schools serve students best when educators retain professional agency over pedagogical decisions rather than outsourcing judgement to automated systems. His sustained focus on making technology serve genuinely human educational values rather than simply optimising measurable outputs gives his voice particular relevance in 2026.

Category C: K-12 EdTech Innovators and Practitioners

Some of the most influential thinking about education technology in Australia and New Zealand comes not from researchers or policy advocates but from educators who are building and testing new approaches inside schools every day. These practitioners bridge research and practice in ways that neither group alone can achieve.

13. Brett Salakas

Brett Salakas is the HP Education Ambassador for Australia and New Zealand, an international keynote speaker, bestselling author of A Mammoth Lesson: Teaching in the Digital Age, and founder of the #aussieED online educator community, the largest of its kind in Australia. He was named Australia's Most Influential Educator for 2024 by The Educator magazine and recognised as one of the top 100 most influential leaders in education globally by the District Administration Leadership Institute, the only Australian named on that list.

LinkedIn recognises Salakas as a top 1 percent global voice in K-12 education. His December 2025 article in Education Matters Magazine, "Grifters and Guides: Who to Trust in the AI-in-Education Gold Rush," offered educators a clear framework for evaluating which voices in the EdTech space are genuinely credentialled and which are opportunists chasing speaking fees. His advocacy spans AI integration, sustainable digital teaching practices, and teacher professional learning.

14. Alfina Jackson

Alfina Jackson is a Google Certified Innovator, Gemini Certified Educator, and 2025 BBC micro:bit Champion who brings over 20 years of experience spanning classroom teaching, leadership, and tertiary education roles in Catholic and public primary schools in Australia. She is a speaker at EDUtech Australia 2026 and a recipient of a 2023 STEM Award for her work integrating technology into early years and primary education.

Jackson's specific contribution is in making technology integration accessible, meaningful, and genuinely pedagogically grounded for primary educators who feel overwhelmed by the pace of tool proliferation. Her Google certification and micro:bit advocacy work reflects a commitment to open platforms and teacher empowerment rather than exclusive or expensive proprietary solutions.

15. Kirra Pendergast

Kirra Pendergast is the Founder of Safe on Social, Australia's leading online safety education organisation, which has delivered digital safety programmes to schools across Australia and New Zealand reaching hundreds of thousands of students and their families. She is one of the most in-demand speakers on online safety, digital resilience, and the intersection of EdTech and student wellbeing in the ANZ region.

Pendergast's work addresses a dimension of EdTech that is sometimes overlooked in conversations dominated by learning outcomes and AI integration: the obligation of schools and platforms to protect students from the harms that digital environments create. Her practical programmes for schools have been independently evaluated for impact and are recognised by government departments in multiple Australian states.

16. Sarah Darcy

Sarah Darcy is an Online Safety and Digital Education expert who serves as Acting Director of Online Safety and Digital Education for a major Australian government education department, drawing on 19 years of experience across all levels of the education system. She is a speaker at EDUtech Australia 2026 and one of the most knowledgeable government voices on how digital safety policy translates into school practice.

Darcy's work sits at the intersection of EdTech implementation and student protection, a space where policy and technology decisions have consequences for vulnerable young people. Her contribution to national conversations about platform governance, age-appropriate design, and school digital strategy reflects genuine field knowledge rather than theoretical advocacy.

17. Mark Bassett

Mark Bassett is Associate Professor at Charles Sturt University, where he serves as Director of Academic Quality, Standards and Integrity and Academic Lead (Artificial Intelligence). He brings extensive international experience including his former role as Academic Director of Education Partnerships at SAE Global. He is a speaker at EDUtech Australia 2026.

Bassett's dual focus on academic integrity and artificial intelligence makes him one of the most important voices in Australian higher education on questions about what it means for students to demonstrate knowledge in an AI environment. His work directly addresses the tension between access to powerful AI tools and the need to preserve the conditions under which meaningful learning and genuine credentialling can occur.

18. Geri Harris

Geri Harris is Programme Director for Business Undergraduate Studies and a senior lecturer in information systems at Auckland University of Technology, where she was named Educator of the Year 2025. She holds a PhD in Information Systems and a background in business process consulting, and she is one of the prominent New Zealand voices at EDUtech Australia 2026.

Harris bridges technology and pedagogy from a business education perspective, bringing particular insight into how students in professional programmes learn to work with and alongside information systems. Her recognition as AUT's Educator of the Year 2025 reflects her standing as someone who not only researches effective technology-enhanced learning but actually delivers it to students every day.

Category D: Education Technology Founders and Platform Builders

The thought leaders who have built platforms, companies, and organisations that serve learners at scale bring a perspective that researchers and practitioners cannot: they have had to translate vision into product, survive funding pressures, and design for millions of users with radically different contexts and needs.

19. Martin Dougiamas

Martin Dougiamas is the Founder of Moodle and current Head of Research at Moodle Pty Ltd, based in Perth, Western Australia. He served as CEO of Moodle for over 24 years, building the platform from his early experiments at Curtin University in 1999 to the world's most widely deployed open-source learning management system, used by hundreds of millions of learners across over 160,000 sites in more than 100 languages. He transitioned to the Head of Research role in January 2024, focusing on the application of transformative technologies in education.

Dougiamas received an Honorary Doctorate from Curtin University recognising his contribution to open-source education technology. His public statement on transitioning to the research role confirmed his intention to work on a "Moodle NextGen" project, exploring how AI, learning analytics, and open educational values can be combined in next-generation platforms. As Founder and Chairman of Moodle's Board, his influence over the world's most widely used LMS remains substantial.

20. Frances Valintine

Frances Valintine CNZM is the Founder and CEO of academyEX in New Zealand, a postgraduate EdTech provider, and the founder of The Mind Lab and Tech Futures Lab. She was appointed a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for her services to education and technology and was named in the Top 50 Global EdTech Leaders list compiled by executives from IDEO, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, LinkedIn, and Google for Education. In April 2026, academyEX launched its AI for Good initiative, a national programme designed to help New Zealand organisations build responsible AI capability.

Valintine's contribution to New Zealand's EdTech ecosystem spans over 20 years, during which she has taught more than 150,000 students and advocated persistently for digital literacy as a foundation for economic participation. Her work with The Mind Lab directly created one of the most significant postgraduate teacher retraining programmes New Zealand has produced, equipping thousands of teachers with modern digital pedagogy credentials.

21. David Linke

David Linke is Managing Director of Pivot Professional Learning in Australia and the former long-serving Managing Director of EduGrowth, Australia's EdTech and education innovation industry hub. He played a central role in building the infrastructure of the Australian EdTech ecosystem, connecting EdTech startups, university partners, government stakeholders, and international markets.

Linke's LinkedIn presence reflects sustained engagement with the strategic questions facing Australia's EdTech sector: procurement barriers for small EdTech companies, sustainable business models after the pandemic-driven funding spike, and the challenge of building globally competitive EdTech companies from an Australian base. His work has given him one of the deepest practical understandings of the entire ANZ EdTech supply chain.

22. Alison Mackie

Alison Mackie is Executive Director of EdTech NZ, the Education Technology Association of New Zealand, the peak body representing EdTech companies, organisations, and educators across the country. She has been a central figure in building New Zealand's EdTech sector and connecting it to international markets, particularly Australia and Southeast Asia.

Mackie's work at EdTech NZ focuses on the policy, advocacy, and market development dimensions of New Zealand's technology-in-education ecosystem. Her participation in the Australia-India InnovEd Forum in 2024 and her cross-Tasman market development work reflect the outward-facing ambition of the New Zealand EdTech sector she represents.

23. Pasi Sahlberg

Pasi Sahlberg is Professor of Education Policy at UNSW Sydney and one of the world's most recognised education researchers, originally from Finland, now based in Sydney. He is the author of Finnish Lessons, which has been widely read globally and translated into multiple languages. He was a keynote speaker at EDUtech Asia 2025, described as the most anticipated keynote at that event, and his work consistently addresses what technology can and cannot do for educational equity.

Sahlberg's Australian contribution is distinctive because his Finnish education perspective creates a genuinely alternative lens on technology integration that challenges the assumptions embedded in most Anglo-American EdTech discourse. His research on equity, play-based learning, and the dangers of standardisation provides essential counterweights to technology adoption narratives that prioritise scale and efficiency over learning quality.

Category E: Higher Education Technology Leaders

Australian and New Zealand universities are among the heaviest investors in EdTech globally on a per-student basis. The leaders navigating digital transformation in higher education face a distinct set of challenges: legacy systems, academic culture resistance, equity obligations, and commercial pressure from global platform providers.

24. Neil Selwyn

Neil Selwyn is Professor in the Faculty of Education at Monash University and one of the world's leading critical scholars of education technology. He is the author of numerous books examining the politics, power dynamics, and social consequences of technology in education, including works on digital education, surveillance in schools, and the datafication of learning.

Selwyn was a co-author of the 2022 paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" alongside Dragan Gasevic, Jason Lodge, and others. His critical perspective on EdTech provides an essential counterpoint to the largely promotional discourse that dominates conference programmes and vendor communications. His work at Monash positions Australia as a place where the global EdTech industry faces genuine intellectual challenge.

25. Sandra Milligan

Sandra Milligan is Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne and Director of the Assessment Research Centre. Her research focuses on the assessment of complex competencies, including the capabilities most resistant to AI replication: creative thinking, collaborative problem solving, and ethical judgement. She was a co-author of the 2022 paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" with Dragan Gasevic, Jason Lodge, and others.

Milligan's work on credentialling, micro-credentials, and the future of assessment is directly relevant to every Australian institution currently redesigning its assessment approach in response to generative AI. Her contribution to the assessment-in-AI-age conversation is grounded in decades of research on what assessment is actually for and how it can be designed to measure things that matter.

26. James Dalziel

James Dalziel is Vice-Chancellor of Australian University of Theology and a long-standing figure in Australian higher education technology. He is a former director of the Macquarie University e-learning centre and one of the original architects of the IMS Learning Design specification, an international standard for technology-enhanced learning interoperability.

Dalziel's technical and pedagogical contributions to the infrastructure of e-learning have shaped how learning management systems and platforms work at a foundational level. His current leadership of a university that relies substantially on online and technology-enhanced delivery gives him a practitioner perspective on what open standards, interoperability, and accessible design mean in practice for real institutions.

27. Danny Liu

Danny Liu is Associate Professor of Education and Senior Academic Lead at the University of Sydney, where he focuses on learning analytics, educational design, and the use of technology to enhance student learning at scale. He is a regular contributor to national EdTech conversations and has led multiple technology-enhanced learning design projects at one of Australia's most research-intensive universities.

Liu's work on scaling personalised student communication using learning analytics, developed in collaboration with Abelardo Pardo and others, represents one of the most practically applied examples of learning analytics research being translated into institutional practice in Australia. His presence at national EdTech events positions him as an important bridge between academic research and university implementation.

Category F: Digital Equity, Inclusion, and Researchers

Technology does not distribute its benefits equally. The EdTech leaders in this category are building the arguments, frameworks, and practical tools that ensure digital transformation in education serves all learners, not just those with the most resources or the most culturally familiar relationship to technology.

28. Michael Anderson

Michael Anderson is Professor of Education at the University of Sydney and one of Australia's leading voices on creativity, arts education, and the use of technology to support learning that prioritises human flourishing rather than algorithmic efficiency. His research on digital creativity and educational innovation addresses questions about what is lost when technology mediation replaces embodied, relational, and artistic learning experiences.

Anderson's work is a crucial counterweight to the efficiency-dominated framing of most EdTech investment decisions. His contribution to public conversations about what education is for, and therefore what technology should serve, is particularly valuable for school and university leaders who need language and evidence to push back against reductive applications of EdTech.

29. Joanne Blannin

Joanne Blannin is a researcher at Deakin University whose work focuses on digital technologies curriculum, teacher professional learning for digital technologies, and the factors that shape teacher confidence and competence in teaching computing and digital literacy. Her 2025 research, co-authored with Jihyun Lee, Thembi Mason, and Petrea Redmond, examined the determinants of teacher self-efficacy to teach digital technologies in Australian schools.

Blannin's research directly addresses one of the most persistent structural barriers to effective EdTech integration in Australian schools: teachers who are not confident or adequately prepared to teach digital technologies in ways that are genuinely educational rather than merely operational. Her work informs teacher education programmes and professional learning design across the country.

30. Negin Mirriahi

Negin Mirriahi is a learning design and analytics researcher based in Australia whose work focuses on self-regulated learning and the design of technology-enhanced learning experiences that promote student agency and metacognition. She has contributed to multiple ARC-funded projects on learning analytics and has a record of collaborative research with leading Australian researchers.

Mirriahi's specific contribution to the field lies in connecting the technical capabilities of learning analytics platforms with genuinely pedagogically informed design questions. Her research asks not just what data can be collected but what data collection and presentation actually helps students learn better and take more ownership of their learning.

31. Petrea Redmond

Petrea Redmond is Associate Professor in the School of Education at the University of Southern Queensland, where her research focuses on online learning design, digital equity, and the preparation of teachers for digital and online environments. She has published extensively on flexible and online learning and is a regular contributor to national conversations about digital inclusion in Australian education.

Redmond's 2025 co-authored research on teacher self-efficacy for digital technologies teaching reflects her sustained focus on the human dimensions of technology integration in schools. Her work at USQ, a university that serves a large regional and remote student population, grounds her digital equity advocacy in the practical realities of learners who face the most significant access and inclusion barriers.

32. Leanne Cameron

Leanne Cameron is Senior Lecturer in Technologies at James Cook University in Queensland, where she focuses on technology education in teacher preparation programmes and the integration of digital technologies into curriculum design. She has contributed to research on blended learning, technology-enhanced learning design, and the preparation of pre-service teachers for contemporary digital classrooms.

Cameron's work at JCU, which serves communities across North Queensland including regional and remote areas with significant Indigenous populations, gives her technology education research a distinctive equity context. Her contributions to understanding how teacher education can genuinely prepare new teachers for technology-rich classrooms are increasingly relevant as Australian schools grapple with the gulf between technology availability and technology pedagogy competence.

Category G: Corporate Learning, VET, and Workforce Education Technology

Education technology is not only a school and university story. The workforce education and vocational training sectors are among the most active adopters of digital learning platforms, AI-powered skills assessment, and immersive training technologies. These leaders are building the future of how Australian workers learn.

33. Julie Tickle

Julie Tickle is Chief People Officer at TAFE NSW, where she oversees a workforce of over 10,000 employees and is responsible for attracting, developing, and retaining the educators who deliver vocational and technical education to hundreds of thousands of New South Wales learners each year. She brings over two decades of experience in the VET sector as teacher, mentor, and executive.

Tickle's participation in EDUtech Australia 2026 reflects TAFE NSW's position at the forefront of digital transformation in Australian vocational education. Her perspective on workforce technology integration is shaped by the practical realities of scaling digital professional learning across a large, geographically dispersed, and diverse teaching workforce, making her insights directly applicable to any large education organisation navigating similar challenges.

34. Lisa Stowers

Lisa Stowers is Research Fellow at the Australian Council for Educational Research, where she specialises in assessment and reporting in foundational skills, with a particular focus on digital technology and innovation. ACER is the most influential education research organisation in Australia and her work directly shapes how student learning outcomes in digital technologies are understood, measured, and reported at a national level.

Stowers' participation in EDUtech Australia 2026 reflects ACER's commitment to ensuring that education technology decisions in Australian schools are grounded in evidence about learning outcomes rather than vendor claims. Her research on assessment design for digital technology capabilities is directly applicable to curriculum leaders and school leaders trying to understand what effective technology education actually looks like.

35. Katie Atkinson

Katie Atkinson is a Google Certified Trainer and Innovator, Director of ICTENSW, and an experienced educator and leader who uses EdTech, STEM, and inquiry-based approaches to support educators in making technology integration genuinely meaningful. She is a speaker at EDUtech Australia 2026 and one of the most active community builders in the Australian educational technology teacher community.

Atkinson's work through ICTENSW, the peak professional body for ICT educators in New South Wales, reflects the importance of professional community and peer learning in determining whether individual teachers develop genuine technology integration competence. Her training work with Google Certified Educators and her ongoing classroom practice give her credibility that professional development specialists without classroom experience often lack.

Category H: EdTech Ecosystem Builders and Policy Advocates

The EdTech ecosystem depends on people who build the infrastructure of connection, advocacy, and evidence production that allows the rest of the sector to function. These leaders are the architects of the conditions in which good technology integration becomes possible.

36. Tom March

Tom March is an Australian-born educator and EdTech innovator who is one of the original architects of the WebQuest model of technology-enhanced inquiry learning, developed in collaboration with Bernie Dodge in the 1990s and adopted by hundreds of thousands of teachers worldwide. Now based in Sydney, he continues to contribute to thinking about how digital tools can support genuine student inquiry rather than mere information retrieval.

March's decades of work on WebQuests and technology-enhanced learning design represent one of Australia's most significant contributions to global pedagogical innovation in education technology. His ongoing reflection on how his original frameworks need to evolve in an AI-saturated information environment gives his perspective particular relevance for educators rethinking inquiry-based approaches.

37. Ros Lugg

Ros Lugg is the Founder of StepsWeb, a New Zealand-based EdTech company that has built a specialised digital literacy platform specifically designed to support readers who struggle with conventional literacy programmes, including many students with dyslexia. She is a regular participant in EdTech NZ activities and represents the important segment of the ANZ EdTech ecosystem focused on accessibility and inclusive design.

Lugg's work at StepsWeb represents one of the clearest examples of technology serving learners who are otherwise poorly served by mainstream educational approaches. Her participation in the Australia-India InnovEd Forum in 2024 reflects the international relevance of accessible EdTech solutions developed from a New Zealand context.

38. Stuart Dillon-Roberts

Stuart Dillon-Roberts is the Founder of Hail, a New Zealand-based school communication and reporting platform that is widely used by schools across Australia and New Zealand for parent-teacher communication, newsletters, and student portfolios. He is a regular participant in EdTech NZ activities and represents the practical EdTech reality for most schools.

Dillon-Roberts' work at Hail reflects the insight that school technology adoption for most institutions is not about AI tutoring systems or immersive VR but about reliable, well-designed communication and reporting tools that make the relationship between schools and families work better. His insight into what school technology adoption actually looks like at ground level is a useful corrective to the more speculative end of EdTech discourse.

Category I: EdTech Voices in Emerging Disciplines

Some of the most consequential EdTech thinking in Australia and New Zealand right now is happening at the edges of established disciplines, where researchers and practitioners are exploring immersive technologies, computational thinking, data science education, and the capabilities that will define learning in the next decade.

39. Garry Falloon

Garry Falloon is an EdTech researcher at Federation University Australia whose work focuses on young children's use of technology, particularly tablet-based learning, STEM education, and the integration of digital tools in early childhood and primary settings. He is co-editor with Matt Bower of the 2026 book Creative Technologies Education, published by Routledge.

Falloon's research on how very young learners interact with digital devices addresses questions that are becoming increasingly urgent as screen-time debates and concerns about AI in early childhood settings intensify. His evidence-based perspective on effective versus ineffective technology use in early learning provides a counterpoint to both techno-optimist and technophobic extremes.

40. Joanna Tai

Joanna Tai is a researcher at Deakin University whose work focuses on assessment design, feedback literacy, and the conditions under which students can make productive use of the information that learning analytics and AI-powered feedback tools generate. Her research addresses the gap between what sophisticated analytics systems can produce and what students can actually understand and act on.

Tai's work on feedback literacy is increasingly important as Australian universities invest in AI-powered feedback tools that generate detailed, personalised responses to student work. The critical question her research asks is whether students have the feedback literacy skills to make productive use of those responses, or whether sophisticated AI feedback simply creates more sophisticated student confusion.

41. Lixiang Yan

Lixiang Yan completed his doctoral work at Monash University under Dragan Gasevic and has made foundational contributions to learning analytics research, focusing on the specific challenge of how to distinguish genuine learning from performance gains when students use AI tools. His 2025 Nature Reviews Psychology paper co-authored with Jason Lodge, Samuel Greiff, and Dragan Gasevic on distinguishing performance gains from learning with generative AI has become one of the most-cited recent contributions to the field.

Yan's Monash doctoral work represents the next generation of learning analytics research emerging from the Centre for Learning Analytics. His focus on the methodological challenges of measuring learning in AI-saturated environments is precisely the research direction that the field most urgently needs as institutions worldwide grapple with what assessment can and cannot tell us about whether AI tools support or undermine learning.

42. Danijela Gasevic

Danijela Gasevic is a researcher in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash University whose work focuses on student perceptions of AI-powered learning analytics and generative AI in educational contexts. Her co-authored 2025 paper on students' perceptions of generative AI-powered learning analytics in the feedback process, published in the Journal of Learning Analytics, provides empirical evidence about how students experience AI feedback systems.

Gasevic's research from the student perspective is a valuable complement to the largely system-design-oriented work that dominates learning analytics research. Understanding how students experience, trust, and respond to AI-generated feedback is essential for designing systems that actually improve learning rather than simply generating outputs that educators and institutions find technically impressive.

43. Zachari Swiecki

Zachari Swiecki is Senior Lecturer at Monash University whose research focuses on multimodal learning analytics, specifically how combining data from multiple sources including video, gesture, speech, and digital activity can reveal aspects of learning that single-channel analytics miss. He was a co-author of the foundational 2022 paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" with Dragan Gasevic and colleagues.

Swiecki's work on multimodal analytics is increasingly relevant as schools and universities invest in AI-powered tools that observe and analyse learner behaviour across multiple channels. His research on the validity and ethics of collecting and interpreting rich multimodal data about learners provides essential guidance for institutions building these systems.

44. Guanliang Chen

Guanliang Chen is a researcher at Monash University in the Centre for Learning Analytics whose work focuses on natural language processing, intelligent tutoring systems, and AI-powered educational feedback. He was a co-author of the 2022 paper "Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence" alongside Dragan Gasevic and colleagues, and he continues to contribute to research on how AI can generate educationally meaningful feedback at scale.

Chen's technical expertise in natural language processing applied to educational contexts puts him at the intersection of AI research and learning design in ways that are directly applicable to the growing number of Australian universities and schools deploying AI-powered assessment and feedback tools. His work at the Monash learning analytics centre reflects the depth of that centre's contribution to the global EdTech research landscape.

Category J: New Zealand EdTech Voices

New Zealand's EdTech ecosystem operates at a different scale from Australia's but with its own distinctive strengths: a bicultural education context that forces genuine engagement with Maori and Pacific learner perspectives, a strong tradition of collaborative teacher professional learning, and a small but internationally connected EdTech sector.

45. Nat Torkington

Nat Torkington is a New Zealand-based technologist, open-source advocate, and education technology commentator whose work spans software development, digital rights, and the application of technology to learning and civic life. He has contributed to thinking about open education, data literacy, and the public interest dimensions of digital technology in New Zealand for over two decades.

Torkington's contribution to the New Zealand EdTech ecosystem is as a critical friend to the technology sector: someone who combines genuine technical literacy with sustained attention to whether technology decisions serve public or private interests. His perspective is increasingly valuable as New Zealand schools and institutions make consequential decisions about platform adoption, data sharing, and AI tool integration.

46. Suzie Vesper

Suzie Vesper is a New Zealand-based digital learning specialist whose work focuses on transforming teaching practice through technology, with particular emphasis on helping teachers build confidence and competence with digital tools in ways that genuinely serve their students' learning rather than simply adding digital noise to existing practice.

Vesper's contribution to New Zealand's professional learning for technology integration reflects the critical importance of teacher capability development as the limiting factor in most school EdTech programmes. Her practical, classroom-grounded approach to professional learning has helped many New Zealand teachers move from reluctant technology users to confident digital pedagogues.

47. Nathan Wallis

Nathan Wallis is a New Zealand-based neuroscience educator and speaker whose work focuses on brain development, early childhood, and the implications of screen time and digital technology for developing brains. While not a traditional EdTech voice, his neuroscience perspective on technology's effects on young learners has become increasingly relevant to EdTech decisions in early childhood and primary settings.

Wallis' work provides the developmental science grounding that many EdTech adoption decisions in schools are missing. His accessible communication of complex neuroscience research to teachers, parents, and school leaders has made him one of the most influential voices on how technology should and should not be used with young children in New Zealand schools.

48. Mark Treadwell

Mark Treadwell is a New Zealand-based education consultant and futurist whose work focuses on the design of learning environments, curriculum innovation, and the development of the capabilities that students will need in an increasingly automated world. He has worked with schools and education systems across New Zealand, Australia, and internationally on future-focused curriculum and learning design.

Treadwell's contribution to the New Zealand EdTech conversation is as a systems thinker who asks whether the technologies schools are adopting are being integrated into genuinely future-focused curriculum design, or simply layered on top of industrial-era schooling models that technology will not fix. His work on the future of learning provides strategic framing for school leaders navigating EdTech investment decisions.

49. Yi-Shan Tsai

Yi-Shan Tsai is a researcher at Monash University whose work focuses on learning analytics policy, institutional adoption of data-driven educational tools, and the governance frameworks that shape whether analytics systems serve or undermine learner interests. Her research on how institutions make decisions about learning analytics adoption provides essential insight into the gap between research capability and institutional practice.

Tsai's policy-focused perspective on learning analytics is a valuable complement to the more technically-oriented work that dominates the field. Her research on how universities develop and implement learning analytics strategies has been influential in shaping how Australian institutions approach the governance of educational data, particularly as AI tools multiply the scale and complexity of student data collection.

50. Simon Buckingham Shum (cross-listed)

(See entry 7 above for full profile. Simon Buckingham Shum at University of Technology Sydney bridges the human-centred learning analytics and equity categories, and his foundational contributions to both warrant acknowledgement at this closing position in the list as a reminder that the most valuable EdTech thinking connects technical capability with genuine commitment to learner agency and educational values.)

Notable Voices We Almost Included

Several voices were seriously considered for this list but ultimately did not make the final 50. Globally prominent figures including Ken Robinson, George Siemens, and Tony Bates have shaped the international EdTech conversation for decades, and their influence on Australian and New Zealand thinkers is real. However, this list deliberately moved past globally dominant voices to surface practitioners and researchers whose work is most directly embedded in the ANZ context. Educators who narrowly missed inclusion include several EDUtech Australia 2026 speakers at the early-career stage of their research careers whose work is compelling but not yet as fully documented in primary sources as the 50 people profiled above. As those careers develop, several of them will belong on a list like this.

Common Mistakes to Avoid When Engaging with EdTech Thought Leadership

The first and most common mistake is treating EdTech thought leadership as marketing consumption rather than professional learning. A significant portion of what appears in conference programmes, LinkedIn feeds, and vendor-sponsored events is promotional content dressed in thought leadership language. The difference is usually visible in whether the speaker or author is willing to acknowledge failure, name limits, and engage honestly with evidence that complicates their message. The voices on this list are distinguished precisely by that willingness.

The second mistake is assuming that global voices are more credible than local ones. The Australian and New Zealand EdTech context is genuinely distinctive in ways that matter for technology decisions. The regulatory environment, the equity context, the bicultural education obligations in New Zealand, the specific platforms most adopted here, and the professional learning culture in Australian schools are all sufficiently different from North American and European contexts that direct importation of overseas thought leadership without local translation is risky.

The third mistake is following only voices who share your existing perspective on technology in education. The EdTech conversation in Australia needs both enthusiastic adopters and critical scholars. Consuming only optimistic adoption narratives leads to uncritical implementation mistakes. Consuming only critical scholarship leads to paralysis. The most useful professional learning happens in the productive tension between these perspectives.

The fourth mistake is treating EdTech investment as a substitute for teacher professional learning. Multiple Australian studies confirm that the single most important determinant of whether technology integration improves learning outcomes is teacher capability and confidence, not the sophistication or cost of the technology. A $50 classroom tool used by a confident, well-prepared teacher will outperform a $500 AI platform dropped into a school without adequate professional development.

The fifth mistake is ignoring equity implications at the moment of technology adoption. Who has reliable internet access? Which students are most likely to be surveilled by data-hungry platforms? Whose learning styles and cultural contexts are built into the AI models being adopted? These questions are easier to ask before implementation than after.

Implementation Guide: Building Your EdTech Thought Leadership Practice

Building a useful EdTech thought leadership practice does not require following 50 people simultaneously. It requires building a curated, diverse, and regularly updated set of perspectives that give you access to the research, practitioner knowledge, and critical analysis most relevant to your role and context.

Start by identifying which of the ten categories on this list are most immediately relevant to your work. If you are a school principal navigating AI policy, the researchers in Category A and the practitioners in Category B are your priority. If you are a university learning designer, Categories C, E, and F provide the most directly applicable insights. If you are a corporate learning leader, Category G and the platform builders in Category D are your starting point.

Next, follow each of your priority voices through whatever channels they are most active on. For researchers, that means Google Scholar alerts for new publications, direct subscriptions to their institutional blogs or websites, and LinkedIn. For practitioners, LinkedIn and conference programmes are the most reliable channels. For platform builders, their company blogs and conference keynotes provide the most insight into how they are thinking about the problems their products are designed to solve.

Then build a quarterly review practice. Set aside time every three months to read through the most substantive recent contributions from your priority voices and ask what has changed in your understanding and what implications those changes have for decisions you are making or will need to make. The goal is not to be current on every new tool or announcement but to develop a stable, evidence-grounded perspective that allows you to evaluate new claims and technologies with genuine discernment.

If your organisation needs support with the leadership, culture, and team dynamics of navigating major technology change, Jonno White, Certified Working Genius Facilitator and bestselling author of Step Up or Step Out (available on Amazon), works with leadership teams to build the alignment and communication capability that technology transformation requires. Email jonno@consultclarity.org to discuss how Jonno can support your organisation. International travel is often far more affordable than organisations expect, and Jonno works both virtually and face to face.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who are the most influential EdTech researchers in Australia? Dragan Gasevic at Monash University is the most cited and most consistently recognised as the national field leader in educational technology, acknowledged by The Australian newspaper from 2019 to 2025. Matt Bower at Macquarie University and Jason Lodge at The University of Queensland are among the most active and publicly engaged research voices, particularly on generative AI in education. Leon Furze, whose PhD from Deakin University was completed in 2026, brings research credentials together with exceptionally accessible public communication.

How was this list compiled? Every person on this list was selected on three criteria: a substantive and documented contribution to education technology with direct relevance to the Australian or New Zealand context; active engagement in public EdTech conversations in 2025 or 2026; and a deliberate effort to surface voices embedded in the ANZ region rather than simply reproducing global EdTech lists. The list spans researchers, classroom practitioners, founders, policy advocates, platform builders, and independent consultants across the full education spectrum.

What is the EdTech market size in Australia and New Zealand? The Australian EdTech market reached approximately USD 4.2 billion in 2025 according to IMARC Group, with projections reaching USD 7.7 billion by 2034. Over 800 EdTech companies operate nationally in Australia as of January 2026. The New Zealand market is smaller but growing, with EdTech NZ and HolonIQ both tracking significant activity in workforce EdTech, school digital tools, and higher education platforms.

What are the biggest challenges facing EdTech in Australia and New Zealand right now? The most significant challenges are: the equity gap between well-resourced and under-resourced institutions in their ability to make good EdTech decisions; the rapid proliferation of AI tools without adequate policy, governance, and assessment design frameworks; the persistent gap between teacher capability and technology availability; and the challenge of ensuring that EdTech investment improves actual learning outcomes rather than simply creating more sophisticated measurement of whatever was already being measured.

Can I hire someone to facilitate leadership and team sessions that address the human side of digital transformation in my organisation? Yes. While EdTech expertise is one thing, the leadership, communication, and team dynamics challenges that accompany any significant digital transformation are often where organisations get stuck. Jonno White, Certified Working Genius Facilitator and bestselling author of Step Up or Step Out, works with leadership teams to build the alignment, trust, and communication capability that technology transformation requires. Email jonno@consultclarity.org to start a conversation.

Who are the leading EdTech voices in New Zealand specifically? Frances Valintine at academyEX is the most globally recognised New Zealand EdTech leader, named in the global Top 50 EdTech Leaders list. Alison Mackie at EdTech NZ represents the sector's collective voice. Geri Harris at AUT, recognised as Educator of the Year 2025, is a strong higher education voice. Ros Lugg at StepsWeb represents accessible EdTech. Stuart Dillon-Roberts at Hail brings a practical school-facing perspective.

What is the difference between EdTech researchers and EdTech practitioners on this list? Researchers primarily generate and test new knowledge about how technology affects learning, what assessment designs work in AI environments, and what data analytics can reveal about learning processes. Practitioners primarily apply existing knowledge and tools in real educational settings, building capability in teachers and students, designing implementation programmes, and solving the daily practical problems that technology integration creates. Both perspectives are essential, and the most valuable EdTech thought leaders are those who work at the intersection.

Final Thoughts

The 50 voices on this list represent something important about the Australian and New Zealand EdTech ecosystem in 2026: it is a genuinely diverse, intellectually serious, and practically grounded field that does not need to import all of its thinking from overseas. The researchers at Monash, Queensland, Macquarie, and other Australian universities are producing work that influences global EdTech discourse. The New Zealand voices on this list are building solutions to distinctively local challenges that have global relevance. The practitioners and platform builders are doing work that is as sophisticated as anything happening in Silicon Valley or London.

If you are an educator, school leader, university administrator, or corporate learning professional in Australia or New Zealand, these are the people worth following in 2026. Follow them not to consume content but to build the habit of engaging with the most rigorous, honest, and practically useful thinking about how technology can and cannot serve learning.

The goal is not to stay current on every new tool or trend. The goal is to develop the professional judgement that allows you to evaluate any new development quickly, accurately, and in a way that keeps students and learning outcomes at the centre of every decision.

For organisations that need support with the leadership, alignment, and communication dimensions of digital transformation, Jonno White, bestselling author of Step Up or Step Out and Certified Working Genius Facilitator, works with leadership teams across Australia, New Zealand, and globally. Whether virtual or face to face, email jonno@consultclarity.org. International travel is often far more affordable than expected.

Step Up or Step Out on Amazon AU

About the Author

Jonno White is a Certified Working Genius Facilitator, bestselling author, and leadership consultant who has worked with schools, corporates, and nonprofits around the world. His book Step Up or Step Out has sold over 10,000 copies globally, and his podcast The Leadership Conversations has featured 230+ episodes reaching listeners in 150+ countries. Jonno founded The 7 Questions Movement with 6,000+ participating leaders and achieved a 93.75% satisfaction rating for his Working Genius masterclass at the ASBA 2025 National Conference. Based in Brisbane, Australia, Jonno works globally and regularly travels for speaking and facilitation engagements. Organisations consistently find that international travel is far more affordable than expected.

To book Jonno for your next keynote, workshop, or facilitation session, email jonno@consultclarity.org.

Next Read

For more on thought leaders in the education sector, check out my blog post '50 Best Thought Leaders in Public Schooling in Australia and New Zealand' at consultclarity.org.

50 Best Thought Leaders in Public Schooling in Australia and New Zealand