Invited Speakers

We are proud to announce the confirmed attendance of some very thought-provoking and internationally renowned speakers. View these speaker profiles below.

Minister Naledi Pandor, MP
Welcome Address,
Opening Plenary Session
Monday, 5 September, 08h45
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Naledi Pandor is South Africa's Minister of Science and Technology. She is the granddaughter of ZK Matthews: lawyer, anthropologist, principal of Fort Hare University and provincial President of the African National Congress in the Cape, who in the late 1940s and 1950s exercised a major guiding and moderating influence on African political history. Her father, Joe Matthews, was a stalwart in the struggle against apartheid, and a life of exile from 1961 until 1984 resulted in a decidedly international flavour to her education. Her higher education qualifications include a BA from the University of Botswana and Swaziland and an MA in Education from the University of London. She completed an MA in Linguistics at Stellenbosch University in 1997 while she was serving as an MP and was the first woman and last Chancellor of the Cape Technikon. Minister Pandor became an MP in 1994 and has amassed impressive experience in positions of public office, including deputy chief whip of the ANC in the National Assembly from 1995 to 1998; deputy chairperson of the National Council of Provinces in 1998; and its Chairperson from 1999-2004. Her experience in education policy planning made her a welcome appointment as South Africa's Minister of Education in 2004. She was appointed Minister of Science and Technology in May 2009.

Lidia Brito
Plenary Address,
Second Plenary Session
Tuesday, 6 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Lidia Brito, Professor for Wood Science at Eduardo Mondlane University in Mozambique, has a Doctorate in Forest and Wood Science from Colorado State University in the USA, was born in Mozambique, and is currently the Director for Science Policies and Sustainable Development of UNESCO. She has held senior positions such as Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs of Eduardo Mondlane University; Minister for Higher Education, Science and Technology of Mozambique; and Advisor for Strategic Planning and External Relations of the Mayor of Maputo City. Her areas of expertise range from forestry and sustainable management of natural resources to higher education, science and technology, to public policies for sustainable development. She has chaired several commissions and task teams in particular on higher education, STI and ICT for sustainable development. She has been and still is a member of several international boards including UNU Council, SciDev Trustee Board, CPRS of ICSU, African Foresters Forum Governing Board, GeSci Advisory Board, and SEI Governing Board, among others.

Her areas of expertise range from forestry and sustainable management of Natural Resources to higher Education, Science and Technology, public policies for sustainable development. She has chaired several commissions and task teams in particular in Higher Education, STI and ICT for Sustainable Development. She has been and still is a member of several international Boards such as UNU Council, SciDev Trustee Board, CPRS of ICSU, African Foresters Forum Governing Board, GeSci Advisory Board, SEI Governing Board, among others.

Executive Mayor Alderman
Patricia de Lille
Welcome Address, Welcome Reception
Sunday, 4 September, 18h45
Ballroom West, CTICC
Patricia de Lille has been involved in politics for the past 34 years fighting injustice. She is known for her role as a trade unionist in the struggle against apartheid and as the initial whistleblower on arms deal corruption in 1999. In 1988, at the height of the struggle against apartheid, Mayor de Lille was elected Vice-President of the National Council of Trade Unions (NACTU) and served as the Regional Secretary of the Chemical Workers Union, the first woman to do so. She became a Member of Parliament in 1994 after leading the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC) delegation to the constitutional negotiations in Kempton Park and went on to Chair the Parliamentary Committee on Transport until 1999. In March 2003 she formed the Independent Democrats (ID), which won national, provincial and local Government seats in the 2004 elections. She went on to serve on the Judicial Services Commission and has sat on numerous Parliamentary Portfolio Committees including Communication, Rural Development and Ethics. Mayor de Lille is a member of the International Parliamentarians against Corruption organisation; was awarded the HIV/AIDS Activist Award from a Canadian organisation; became one of the Top 5 Women in Government and Government Agencies; won the Rapport/City Press "Woman of the Year" award in 2006; is a former Chancellor of the Durban Institute of Technology; is an Honorary Colonel in the SANDF; serves on the Boards of the African Monitor and the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund; and recently retired from the board of the Helen Suzman Foundation. Before her election as Mayor of Cape Town she was the Western Cape Minister of Social Development, following the merger of the Independent Democrats and the Democratic Alliance, and was once described by Nelson Mandela as "a strong, principled woman" and his "favourite opposition politician".

Bakary Diallo
Plenary Address,
Fourth Plenary Session
Thursday, 8 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Dr Bakary Diallo has been working in the education sector for the past 20 years as a secondary school teacher, an academic, a consultant, a project administrator and a researcher. In August 2005 he joined the African Virtual University (AVU), an intergovernmental organisation based in Nairobi, Kenya, specialising in open, distance and electronic learning. He held several senior positions within the organisation before his appointment as the CEO/Rector of the AVU in August 2007. Prior to joining the AVU he worked at the University of Ottawa as a part-time lecturer in the Faculty of Education from July 2001 to July 2005, and as a Consultant of Integration of ICT in Education at the Center for University Teaching. He taught at the secondary level in Senegal from 1988 to 1997 before joining the University of Ottawa in 1997. Dr Diallo is fully bilingual (French and English).

Ron Eglash
Plenary Address,
Second Plenary Session
Tuesday, 6 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Dr Ron Eglash received his BS in Cybernetics, his MS in Systems Engineering, and his PhD in History of Consciousness, all from the University of California. A Fulbright postdoctoral fellowship enabled his field research on African ethnomathematics, which was published by Rutgers University Press as African Fractals: modern computing and indigenous design, and recently appeared as his TED talk. He is a Professor of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he teaches design of educational technologies and graduate seminars in social studies of science and technology. His "Culturally Situated Design Tools" software, offering math and computing education from indigenous and vernacular arts, is available for free at www.csdt.rpi.edu. Recently funded work includes his NSF "Triple Helix" project, which brings together graduate fellows in science and engineering with local community activists and K-12 educators to seek new approaches to putting science and innovation in the service of under-served populations.

George Ellis
Dinner Address, Gala Dinner
Wednesday, 7 September, 19h30
Moyo Stellenbosch at
Spier Wine Estate
Professor George FR Ellis is Professor Emeritus of Applied Mathematics at the University of Cape Town, South Africa and GC MacVittie Visiting Professor of Astronomy at Queen Mary College, London University, UK. His professional research work focuses on relativity theory and cosmology; complexity studies; the brain; science research policy; science education issues; and science and religion studies. After completing his PhD at the University of Cambridge in 1964 he contributed as a Visiting Professor at many prestigious universities, including (among others) University of Chicago, University of Hamburg, Boston University, University of Alberta, Edmonton, and University of Texas, Austin. From 1988 to 1993 he was the Professor of Cosmic Physics at the International School of Advanced Studies (SISSA), in Trieste, Italy. Professor Ellis is a Fellow of the Royal Society of London (FRS), and between 1982 and 1995 was a member of the International Committee of International Society of Relativity and Gravitation where he served as President from 1989 to 1992. Awards for his work include the Star of South Africa Medal given by President Nelson Mandela in 1999; the Templeton Prize in 2004 for making an exceptional contribution to affirming life's spiritual dimension; the Order of Mapungubwe (Silver) awarded by President Thabo Mbeki in 2006; and the South Africa Institute of Physics Gold Medal in 2010. Professor Ellis has contributed to over 300 scientific papers, mainly on relativity theory and cosmology, and has written a number of significant books on science and policy since his first in 1973, The Large Scale Structure of Space Time, with Stephen Hawking (Cambridge University Press).

John Falk
Plenary Address,
Fourth Plenary Session
Thursday, 8 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Dr John H Falk is known internationally for his expertise on free-choice learning: the learning that occurs in settings like science centres, parks, and on the Internet. He has authored more than 100 scholarly articles and chapters in the areas of learning, biology and education, more than a dozen books, and helped to create several nationally important out-of-school science education curricula. Notable recent books include: Identity and the Museum Visitor Experience (2009); Free-Choice Learning and the Environment (2009, with Joe Heimlich and Susan Foutz); Exemplary Science Programs: Informal Science Education (2007, with Robert Yager); In Principle, In Practice: Museums as Learning Institutions (2007, with Lynn Dierking and Susan Foutz); Thriving in the Knowledge Age: New Business Models For Museums and Other Cultural Institutions (2006, with Beverly Sheppard); and Free-Choice Science Education: How People Learn Outside of School (2001). He is currently Sea Grant Professor of Free-Choice Learning at Oregon State University (OSU). Along with colleagues, Dr Falk has created the first doctoral and masters programmes in the areas of science and mathematics free-choice learning. Before joining the OSU faculty he founded and for 20 years directed the Institute for Learning Innovation where he oversaw more than 200 research and evaluation projects. He also spent 14 years at the Smithsonian Institution where he held a number of senior positions. Dr Falk serves on the editorial boards of the journals Science Education and Curator, and on a variety of national and international boards. He received a joint doctorate in Biology and Education from the University of California at Berkeley, and earned MA and BA degrees in Zoology from the same institution. In 2006, Dr Falk and Dr Lynn Dierking were recognised by the American Association of Museums (AAM) as among the 100 most influential museum professionals of the past 100 years. In 2010 Dr Falk was further recognized by AAM with the John Cotton Dana Award for Leadership. Among Dr Falk's recent projects is a series of National Science Foundation and privately funded projects focused on understanding the role of identity-related motivations on museum visitor behaviour and learning and investigations into the contribution of informal education to public understanding of science.

Robert Firmhofer
Invited Speaker, International
Approaches to the Development
of Science Centres and Non-Formal
Science Education
Monday, 5 September, 13h50
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Robert Firmhofer, graduate of history of philosophy at Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University, is the co-leader of the project aimed at building the first science centre in Poland. In 2004, after creating the concept of the exploratorium and presenting it to Lech Kaczyński, president of Warsaw, and to Michał Kleiber, minister of science, he was nominated to be the president's proxy for the science centre project and the leader of the team responsible for the project. Within the next two years, in agreement with the Programme Council, his team developed a detailed concept of the interactive exhibitions, a programme plan, as well as contentrelated and financial assumptions for the "Copernicus Science Centre" government programme. At the same time he was preparing the legal and organizational concept of the science centre, as well as the functional scheme for the architectural project that became the foundation for the international architectural competition. Robert Firmhofer participated in selecting the best project as the deputy director of the competition jury. As the head of the committee he concluded the contract with Rar-2 Laboratory of Architecture.

In 2006, after registering the cultural institution named "Copernicus Science Centre", Hanna Gronkiewicz Waltz – president of Warsaw – nominated Robert Firmhofer as the head of the institution after consulting with the minister of science and higher education. In the following years, as the proxy of the president of Warsaw, Robert Firmhofer participated in the realisation of the construction investment that started in 2008 and resulted in the most modern interactive exhibition of science, technology and art in Poland. On the 5th of November, Copernicus Science Centre started operating in its new location in Warsaw at Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 20. The opening was inaugurated with a spectacle entitled "The Big Bang", directed by Peter Greenaway and Saskia Bodekke. During the first five months the Centre was visited by 3,000,000 people and it started being quoted as an example of the modernisation of Poland.

Robert Firmhofer is also the co-originator of the Science Picnic of Polish Radio and has been acting as the Science Picnic's organisational committee director since 1997. During that time, the Science Picnic has become the biggest European open-air event popularising science. More than 200 scientific and educational institutions from 20 countries participate in the Science Picnic. In 2004, the European Commission chose the Picnic as one of the 10 best European projects that promote the idea of science and society. Between 1994 and 2004, Robert Firmhofer acted as the assistant manager of the Polish Radio BIS, the educational programme of the Polish Radio, and between 2004 and 2005 he was the chief editor of the Polish Radio's Science Popularisation Section. He is also a member of the Science Promotion Council and the Science Festival Programme Council. Robert Firmhofer is a member of Ecsite, the association of European science centres and museums. He was elected president of Ecsite in 2011.

Patrick Garratt
Welcome Address, Two Oceans
Aquarium Evening Excursion
Monday, 5 September, 19h30
Two Oceans Aquarium
After obtaining a degree in Marine Biology at the University of Natal, Pat Garratt joined the Oceanographic Research Institute in Durban where he worked as a marine scientist for 12 years. During this period he studied the commercial and sport fisheries of KwaZulu- Natal and completed both MSc and PhD degrees. He was Curator of Seaworld Aquarium in Durban for three years before moving to Cape Town where he was given the opportunity, as Curator, to design and stock the Two Oceans Aquarium - which was under construction at the time. He held this position until September 2003, when he was promoted to Managing Director. During his tenure as Director, he has ensured the economic viability of the Aquarium whilst achieving a good balance between the business and its education and conservation efforts. He is currently Chair of the International Aquarium Congress (IAC) Steering Committee and Vice-Chair of the International Aquarium Forum (IAF).

Mohamed Hassan
Invited Speaker,
International Approaches to the
Development of Science Centres
and Non-Formal Science Education
Monday, 5 September, 13h50
Auditorium 2, CTICC

Professor Mohamed HA Hassan is the recently retired Executive Director of the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS), President of the African Academy of Sciences (AAS), Co-Chair of the Global Network of Science Academies (IAP), and serves on a number of committees in other organizations worldwide. He was born in Sudan in 1947 and holds a PhD in Plasma Physics from the University of Oxford, UK (1974). A former professor and dean of the School of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Khartoum, he received the Order of Scientific Merit of Brazil. Professor Hassan is a fellow of TWAS, AAS, and the Islamic Academy of Sciences; an honorary member of the Colombian Academy of Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences; corresponding member of the Belgian Royal Overseas Academy of Sciences; and foreign fellow of the Pakistan Academy of Sciences. His research areas include theoretical plasma physics, physics of wind erosion and sand transport.

Hubertus Külps
Plenary Address,
Opening Plenary Session
Monday, 5 September, 08h45
Auditorium 2, CTICC
As Head of Global
Communications for SAP AG, Hubertus Külps is responsible for all communications activities with SAP stakeholders around the globe, including employees, media, analysts and governments. In his role, Külps also acts as an advisor to the Co-CEOs of SAP AG, Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe, regarding all aspects of communications strategy and execution. Külps has more than 13 years of experience in corporate and public communications. He was with Allianz SE for 11 years, where he last served as Head of Communications for Allianz of America and Fireman's Fund Insurance Company in the United States. Previous roles included Chief Operating Officer of Allianz Life Insurance Malaysia as well as department head and financial spokesperson at Allianz Group Communications in Munich. Prior to Allianz, Külps was the Head of Communications at the German American Chamber of Commerce in New York. He holds a German law degree and a Bachelor of Arts from Middlebury College in the USA.

Thebe Medupe
Invited Speaker, International
Approaches to the Development
of Science Centres and
Non-Formal Science Education
Monday, 5 September, 13h50
When Halley's Comet passed near the earth in 1986, it sparked off Thebe Medupe's interest in astronomy. From modest beginnings in a small South African village near Mafikeng, and at the age of thirteen, he built his first telescope and made his own map of the moon.

After matriculating at Mmabatho High School, he proceeded to study physics and astronomy at the University of Cape Town. It was here that he earned his MSc (cum laude) in astrophysics.

Thebe has authored and co-authored more than 35 scientific research papers for publication, edited two academic books, written two children books on astronomy and a high-school level book on the history of astronomy in Africa. He has obtained his doctorate in Astrophysics from the University of Cape Town (December 2002), to become one of the first three black South African astronomers. His research focuses on the use of sound waves, generated inside stars, to probe the interiors of a particular class of pulsating stars (asteroseismology). Part of his doctoral research was conducted at the Institute of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Aarhus in Denmark. He has successfully supervised a PhD student, and about 10 honours students. He currently has two MSc students and two honours students. He presented a special invited lecture in London at the invitation of the Royal Society of Britain. He is currently an associate Professor at the North West University (Mafikeng Campus), working and continuing his research at the University. He is also a research fellow at SAAO - the South African Astronomical Observatory in Cape Town. He is involved in various committees on astronomy in South Africa, and is in the executive of a special programme for training students on MSc (astronomy). He heads a project called Timbuktu Science Project whose aim is to search for science in the ancient manuscripts from Timbuktu, an ancient city in Mali (West Africa).

His life story became part of the film called Cosmic Africa in which he visited remote villages in Africa, searching for ordinary villagers' knowledge about the night sky. Cosmic Africa is his first film project. He has also contributed to a new film on the Timbuktu manuscripts.

Rooksana Omar
Welcome Address, Iziko South
African Museum Evening Excursion
Tuesday, 6 September, 19h30
Iziko South African Museum
Before joining the Iziko Museums as CEO Designate and on becoming the Chief Executive Officer, Rooksana Omar served in various capacities that have advanced the heritage sector in general, and museums in particular. She served as Director of the Luthuli Museum from 2006-2010, and before that was the Acting Director of eThekwini Heritage at the eThekwini Municipality (2001-2005). She is the past president of the South African Museums Association, the current President of the International Council of Museums, South Africa, and newly elected President of the Commonwealth Museums Association. Rooksana served on the Arts and Culture Trust of the President, sponsored by Nedbank, from 1998-2003. Prior to these appointments she served as the public assistant librarian at Durban Municipal Library, education officer and researcher of the Local History Museums in Durban (now eThekwini) and was its first black woman Director of a Museum, appointed in 1996. Rooksana has devoted the last 30 years of her life to the service of heritage from the most local to the highest levels in South Africa. She is happiest when meeting the challenges of building a nation, networks, partnerships and programmes with and through the heritage sector. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts Degree and an Honours Degree in history from the then University of Durban-Westville and later proceeded to complete a Masters in Business Administration. The MBA was a personal undertaking because she felt that one of the most essential skills in the post-apartheid re-structuring of the heritage sector was the need to manage and give strategic direction in transformation to a sector that had in the past denigrated and downplayed the importance of the majority's history and culture. Managing the valorizing of the majority's history and culture in the post-apartheid period has become Rooksana's life's work. Her personal focus is on good governance and social justice and she is personally committed to ensuring that museums become part of the mainstream life in South Africa.

Yonah Seleti
Plenary Address,
Second Plenary Session
Tuesday, 6 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
Yonah Seleti has worked as an academic, heritage expert and policymaker and implementer. As an academic he obtained his doctorate from the University of Dalhousie, Nova Scotia, Canada. He has taught at the Universities of Zambia, Lesotho and Natal and has been visiting professor at the Universities of Tulane (New Orleans) and Roskilde (Denmark). He has published on history; peace and strategic studies; heritage; indigenous knowledge systems; and science and technology. He has served on ministerial committees such as the History Committee under former Minister of Education Kader Asmal and the Ministerial committee on the development of the National Curriculum Statement for FET. He served on technical teams that drafted the Heritage Transformation Charter and the Library and Information Services Charter under the auspices of the Department of Arts and Culture. Currently he is Chief Director at the Department of Science and Technology (South Africa) responsible for interfacing Indigenous Knowledge Systems in the National System of Innovation of South Africa. Dr Seleti has also worked in the heritage sector as a director of the Campbell Collections of the University of KwaZulu-Natal and as heritage manager at the Freedom Park Trust. He helped map the conceptual framework for the Freedom Park Trust, an institution committed to the memorial of South Africa's liberation struggle through exhibitions, the garden of remembrance and the wall of remembrance "Skhumbuto".

Claudia Urrea
Plenary Address,
Fourth Plenary Session
Thursday, 8 September, 09h00
Auditorium 2, CTICC
As the Director of Learning for Latin America at One Laptop per Child (OLPC), Claudia Urrea is in charge of designing, developing, and implementing a learning vision for the region. She also collaborates with all OLPC learning teams and local co-ordinators around the world to provide a solid learning development programme. Dr Urrea was born in Colombia where she received an undergraduate degree in Computer Science from EAFIT University. In the mid-1990s she moved to the USA where she received her Master's degree in Educational Media and Technology from Boston University, and her doctorate degree from MIT Media Lab. Her PhD thesis studied the implications of one-to- one learning in a rural setting in Latin America. She helps empower and support schools and communities of learners to evolve from traditional teaching methods and materials into progressive learning environments, using state of the art technologies developed at MIT Media Lab. Dr Urrea holds a visiting research position with the Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab, and teaches an anthropology class for Harvard Summer School. She has consulted with ministries of education (Colombia, Costa Rica, Brazil, and Haiti) and organisations such as the Inter-American Development Bank, and SEED-Schlumberger to rethink learning.