Partnerships, innovation, and equity : A case study of contextualised, blended learning for displaced learners in the PADILEIA project

Author's Biography

Dr Mike Bennett is an Associate Director, Academic Affairs with more than 15 years’ experience in digital, professional, and transnational education. He has held senior academic and management roles across UK institutions, building expertise that bridges academic affairs, strategic leadership, and student experience. His doctoral and postdoctoral research centres on curriculum design, graduate employability, and experiential learning in diverse educational settings. Mike is particularly interested in how institutions can design inclusive, future-facing curricula that support lifelong learning and global engagement. He is also actively involved in initiatives to improve the quality of online education, with a focus on developing robust digital learning strategies and ensuring pedagogical coherence across diverse delivery modes in higher and professional education.

Gayatri Menon is a Senior Research & Engagement Coordinator at King’s College London, working across King’s Digital and King’s Professional and Executive Development. Her work sits at the intersection of online higher education, learning design, educational technology, market and user research, and strategic portfolio development. Gayatri contributed to the Partnership for Digital Learning and Increased Access (PADILEA) project in King’s Digital as an E-Learning Assistant and Trainee Learning Designer, before being promoted to Learning Designer. In these roles, she supported the design, development, and quality assurance of online learning, and contributed to research and development projects exploring digital pedagogy, student experience, and emerging educational technologies. She has also led user research and engagement initiatives to inform the development and improvement of online programmes across multiple faculty areas. Gayatri holds an MSc in Forensic Mental Health Research from King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry and a BSc in Psychology from Drexel University. Her professional interests include inclusive online education, evidence-informed learning design, and innovation in digital higher education.

Dr Gennadii Miroshnikov is a Senior Learning Designer at King’s College London with over 15 years’ experience in technology-enhanced and blended learning across higher and professional education. He regularly contributes as a visiting lecturer at several UK universities, including the Open University and the University of Sussex, where he teaches topics such as systems thinking and its interdisciplinary applications. His research focuses on the integration of systems thinking into educational practice, with particular interest in scenario planning, strategic forecasting, and the development of future-oriented learning design. Gennadii is also actively involved in academic development initiatives that explore innovation in digital education and curriculum transformation. He works extensively on enhancing the quality of online education, contributing to institutional strategies for improving learning design, student engagement, and pedagogical alignment in both higher and professional education contexts.

Andrea Amato is a Maltese product designer based in London, working at the intersection of research and visual design to shape modern digital experiences. With an MSc in Psychology, she brings a human-centred lens to interaction design and digital strategy, creating inclusive and impactful solutions grounded in data.

Rabih Shibli is the Executive Director of the Center for Community Engagement (CCE) and a lecturer in Public Policy and International Affairs (PPIA) at the American University of Beirut (AUB). His work bridges architecture and planning, with a focus on designing for communities affected by conflict and trauma. Among his most notable humanitarian initiatives is Ghata (Arabic for ‘cover’), a portable campus model that integrates education, livelihoods, and psychosocial support for refugees in protracted crises. The project has received the Fritz Redlich Global Mental Health and Human Rights Award from the Harvard Program in Refugee Trauma, as well as the SXSW Learn by Design Honorary Award. Beyond Ghata, Rabih has led and piloted several programmes, including Digital Skills Training, the Partnership for Digital Learning and Increased Access, and the Strengthening Tertiary Education Pipeline, which aim to expand employability and access to higher education for refugees and other marginalised groups. His recent work focuses on institutionalising curricular community engagement within general education for all university students. Rabih’s primary contribution to the academic field of community engagement is his Frontline Framework, which advocates for universities to develop the vision and infrastructure needed to integrate theoretical classroom knowledge with practical skills and ethical orientation, enabling students to address pressing challenges in highly contested environments. Rabih is currently perusing his PhD in Conflict Studies whereby his research focuses on postwar reconstruction as an ideological instrument governed by anxiety to assert territorial control and political hegemony.

Dr Tania Lima is the Director of Global Engagement at King’s College London, responsible for the university’s academic partnerships and country offices; in this role, she leads on partnership strategy for education and research collaborations, including implementation, delivery and evaluation, working closely with all Faculties at King’s. Tania was the Lead in Partnership for Digital Learning and Increased Access, a programme to increase access to higher education for Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon using blended learning approaches. Tania has a B.Sc. in Biology from Universidade de Sao Paulo in Brazil, a Masters in Microbiology and Immunology from Federal University of Sao Paulo, and was a PhD exchange student in Molecular Biology at New York University, where she was also a post-doctoral fellow. She has experience in international collaborative initiatives in genomics, bioinformatics and proteomics, as well as collaborations in cancer research, with a particular focus on international consortia and global partnerships. At Universities UK she was responsible for scholarship, capacity-building and research collaboration programmes, with special focus on government funding programmes, outward student mobility, transnational education, and international scholarship schemes.