Chairperson – Diane Dalby (UK)
Diane is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Research in Mathematics Education, University of Nottingham. She previously worked in Further Education colleges in England for over 20 years, in various management and teaching roles, before commencing a full-time doctorate at the university and later progressing to her current role. Her doctoral study focused on the experiences of vocational students learning functional mathematics in Further Education colleges and Diane has since worked on several national and international mathematics research projects. Her research interests include the teaching of mathematics in post-16 education for disaffected and low-attaining students, the post-16 mathematics curriculum, the enactment of policy in Further Education and the positioning of mathematics within vocational education. Diane has also been active for many years as an educational consultant, trainer and external examiner, taking a special interest in mathematics teaching and FE management.
Trustee – Charlotte Arkenback (Sweden)
Charlotte was elected vice-Chair of Trustees in Lund 2019. She is a PhD student in Learning, Communication and Applied Information Technology in the Department of Applied IT, University of Gothenburg. Her research focuses on work and work-based training and learning within the increasingly connected service sector. The specific interest concerns the transformation of work and vocational competencies implementing smartphone technologies and cloud-based management information systems in personal meetings. The example in the study is sales assistants´ vocational practices at the checkout and on the sales floor in connected brick-and-mortar stores.
Trustee and Secretary – Catherine Byrne (Ireland)
Catherine Byrne has been a teacher of mathematics and basic skills in Irish Prisons for many years. She teaches all levels of mathematics to prisoners, teaching accredited and non-accredited courses. She has an interest in assessment, motivation for starting mathematics in this context, mathematical self-efficacy, mathematical resilience, affective aspects of learning mathematics, the impact of learning on identity in this context. She is also a PhD student in Dublin Institute of Technology, researching mathematics in prison education.
Trustee – Javier Díez-Palomar (Spain)
Javier Díez-Palomar. He is associate professor in de Department of Linguistic and Literary Education, and Teaching and Learning of Experimental Sciences and Mathematics, at the University of Barcelona. He is member of CREA, Community of Research for Excellence for All. He is president of the Association of Multidisciplinar Educational Research (AMIE) since 2019, which is member of WERA (World Educational Research Association). He is also member of the Numeracy Expert Group (OECD) working at the PIAAC survey (2018-2023). He is former chief editor for Adults Learning Mathematics International Journal, and current member of the Editorial Board. He has been working with adult learners as volunteer since 1999, learning and promoting the dialogic learning approach. He is now working on numeracy. In this sense, he is member of the Erasmus + project Common European Numeracy Framework, and member of the Working Group on Adult Mathematics Education at CERME12. He has participated also as expert in the elaboration of the framework for the new educational Law of Adult Education in Spain.
Trustee – David Kaye (UK)
David is the former Chair of Trustees. He has contributed to ALM in many ways since 1995; he was previously the Secretary and has been part of the organising committee and co-editor of the proceedings for two international conferences. He works in adult numeracy professional development, which is supported by substantial experience in teaching adult numeracy in a further education college in London. Prior to this career in education he was in local government. David has a deep and sustained interest in the history of mathematics and in particular the development of using the history of mathematics in adult numeracy and in teacher training. He has an MA in Education and a BA in the history and philosophy of science and technology. Both are from the Open University achieved whilst working full time. He is also a director of the education consultancy Learning Unlimited Ltd.
Trustee – Lena Lindenskov (Denmark)
Lena (Brasen) Lindenskov. She is associate professor in mathematics education at Department of Educational Theory and Curriculum Studies, Danish School of Education, Aarhus University. Her office is at the Copenhagen Campus.
Her research focus on children’s, adolescents’ and adults’ interest and difficulties in learning mathematics, and on mathematical/numeracy competence related to democracy. She has been involved in European Union projects focusing on adults learning mathematics: ALMAB 2000-03, MIA 2004-07, EMMA 2005-07, Sharing best practice in vocational class room 2011-13. She presented at the conferences ALM4, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 17, 26 and 28. In addition, she participated 1999-2004 in developing the Danish national curriculum and teacher training for Preparatory Adult Education in mathematics, with Tine Wedege and Bjarne Sonberg. Too, she was at the Danish mathematics team in PISA 1999-2019.
Trustee – Lynda Ginsburg (USA)
Lynda Ginsburg works as a researcher and developer at Rutgers University, the state university of New Jersey, USA.
She is also a board member of the USA sister organisation: Adult Numeracy Network.
Trustee and Membership Secretary – Lisanne Heilmann (Germany)
Lisanne Heilmann is a researcher at the University of Hamburg. Her research focusses on numeracy and literacy of adults, especially concerning vulnerability and societal power relations. She researches how constructs of literacy and numeracy are used to empower adults but also to exclude or marginalise certain populations.
She worked on the German nation-wide ‘LEO-Survey 2018 – Living with low literacy’. This large-scale assessment tests the literacy skills of the German population and surveys further basic competencies such as financial, digital, political or health-related skills and practices. She is also the project coordinator of the Hamburg Numeracy Project, a Hamburg-based joint research project on the role of numeracy as a part of adult’s basic education.
She is currently finishing her PhD on deconstructing literacy and numeracy expectations and analysing the invisible power relations they are embedded in.
Trustee and webmaster – Linda Jarlskog (Sweden)
Linda Jarlskog, is an adult educator in mathematics, physics and chemistry. Her current workplace is Komvux, Lund, located in southern Sweden. Her interest in teaching maths has grown stronger with the years. Before Linda went on to teach she devoted herself to solid state physics. In addition to teaching Linda writes her first textbook in mathematics. The teaching material is aimed toward adult learners with a foreign first language studying basic math. In addition to her interest in teaching mathematics Linda dedicates a lot to art.
Trustee – Judy Larsen (Canada)
Judy Larsen is an associate professor at the University of the Fraser Valley where she teaches mathematics upgrading courses as well as courses designed for prospective mathematics teachers. As a doctoral candidate at Simon Fraser University, she currently pursues research into the generative possibilities of community spaces related to mathematics education, including those within social media settings. She is also deeply interested in environments that occasion mathematical thinking, the role of autonomy in mathematics classrooms, affective aspects of learning mathematics, and mathematics teacher professional learning. She actively participates in the online mathematics education community via Twitter at @JudyLarsen3 and hosts a website at judylarsen.ca.
Trustee 2022/23 – Niamh O´Meara (Ireland)
Honorary Trustees
- Prof Diana Coben, National Centre of Literacy and Numeracy for Adults and University of Waikato, New Zealand
- Dr Gail FitzSimons, Melbourne University, Australia
- Dr Marj Horne, Australian Catholic University, Melbourne, Australia
- Lisbeth Lindberg, Göteborg University, Sweden
- Prof Juergen Maasz, University of Linz, Austria
- Dr Terry Maguire, Director National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education
- Prof John O’Donoghue, University of Limerick, Ireland
- Dr Katherine Safford-Ramus, Saint Peter’s College, Jersey City, New Jersey, USA
- Dr Alison Tomlin, King’s College London, UK
- Dr Mieke van Groenestijn, Utrecht University of Professional Education, Utrecht,
The Netherlands