LEEF Keynote Presenters

In a world barraged by multimedia and multiple sources of information, organizations are realizing the power of games to engage their target audience. Scientific American suggests that gaming is one of 10 world-changing ideas 2011 While many organizations intuitively understand the power of gaming, most don’t have a game strategy. Gamification is the broad trend of applying game mechanics to non-game environments. In this key note session, Caroline Avey will bring her 20 year gaming experience to  explore various game mechanics,  the effectiveness of game mechanics in learning, and demonstrations of game mechanics, games and simulations, plus cutting edge game research with the Xerox Innovations Group.

Bio: Caroline has seventeen years experience in instructional strategy, design and development, working on custom and generic projects for Fortune 500 clients. Currently, she is known for her work on developing strategies and practical applications for use of Web 2.0 technologies in learning. She leads a team of strategists and developers who design, develop and deliver solutions in 3D-virtual worlds, quasi-3D, m-learning, mobile tagging, social networking tools and other Web 2.0 technologies such as the use of iPads as a learning kiosk. Her teams have won industry awards for simulations and gaming.  Currently, she is working with Xerox Research to explore the use of Game Mechanics in learning. She has assisted clients with strategies for use of social technologies in blended learning, assessment of technologies for use in client environments, and lead teams for learner propensity and preference studies.

She has assisted clients with development of learning paths, competency models, curriculum design, needs assessments, learning media selection guidelines, as well as, strategies for curriculum deployment and development of informal learning. Caroline has experience in a variety of media including instructor-led workshops, webcasts, multi-media, live experiential simulations, games, resource guides, competency profiles, curriculum development, executive workshops, resource support materials such as job aids, learning events at conferences, and most recently a web-based training with simulated learning paths.  Additionally, Caroline has worked to launch a BPO learning team for a major, global firm. In this responsibility she has co-developed the tools, processes, infrastructure, staffing, and staffing development for this outsourced team.

Prior to her work with ACS, Caroline has 15 years experience as an investment banker/financial consultant to Fortune 500 clients. Her industry experience includes transportation, health & pharmaceuticals, finance, natural resources, energy, electronics, consumer goods, banking and telecom. Caroline has developed materials globally for use in Europe, Central Europe, the Pacific Rim, India, and South America. She is an experience facilitator for leading executive learning strategy meetings, design sessions, and subject-matter resource workshop sessions.

Caroline is a featured speaker and author for Training Industry, Masie Learning, DevLearn,  and CLO for her work in Web 2.0 strategic initiatives for clients. She won the Innovator of the Year award for ACS, acknowledging her work in providing creative and cutting edge distance delivery solutions for clients.

Bio: Jesse is the CEO of Schell Games, the largest game studio in Pennsylvania. He also is a member of the faculty at the Carnegie Mellon University Entertainment Technology Center. Jesse has worked on a wide variety of innovative game and simulation projects, but he is best known for his award winning book The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses and for Beyond Facebook, a talk at the 2010 DICE Summit where he described a future where games and life become indistinguishable. He is a former chair of the International Game Developers Association, and in 2004 he was named one of the world’s Top 100 Young Innovators by MIT Technology Review. Before starting his own company, Jesse was the Creative Director of the Walt Disney Imagineering Virtual Reality Studio, which helped to develop interactive theme park attractions as well as Toontown Online, the first massively multiplayer game for children. Before that, he worked as writer, director, performer, juggler, comedian, and circus artist for both Freihofer’s Mime Circus and the Juggler’s Guild.