Keynote Speakers

Joan DeJaeghere is a Distinguished International Professor of Comparative and International Development Education and co-chair of the UNESCO Chair in Education, Equity, and Wellbeing at the University of Minnesota. As faculty director of Global Education Research, she focuses on educational inequalities, democratic citizenship, sustainable livelihoods, and wellbeing. She has authored four books, including Reflexive Mixed Methods Research (2024) and Educating Entrepreneurial Citizens (2017), and over 60 articles. A former Fulbright Fellow in Vietnam (2013) and Visiting Fellow in Australia and India (2023), she leads transdisciplinary research and partnerships in over 15 countries, including collaborations with UNESCO, the Global Partnership for Education, and the Mekong Development Research Institute.

Professor Ly Tran is a leading scholar in international education at Deakin University’s School of Education. She leads two Australian Government-funded projects: the Australia-Vietnam Enhanced Economic Engagement Strategy (EEES) - Internationalisation of Higher Education, co-hosted with Vietnam’s Ministry of Education, and the Best Practice in International Student Engagement. She founded the Australia-Vietnam International Education Centre and leads the International Student Graduate Employability Research Group. Recognized as one of The PIE’s “Top 50 Voices” (2023), she has received awards like the Melbourne Asia Game Changer Award and IEAA Excellence Awards (2014, 2021). Prof. Tran has delivered over 100 keynote and plenary talks globally, specializing in international student experiences, graduate employability, student mobility, and higher education internationalisation in the Australia-Asia context.

Dr. Hiroshi Ota is a Professor at the Center for General Education at Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, where he serves as Director of the Hitotsubashi University Global Education Program. Prior to his current position, he worked for the Office for the Promotion of International Relations at Hitotsubashi University, the School of Commerce and Management as International Student Advisor at Hitotsubashi University, the Office of International Education at the State University of New York at Buffalo, and Toyo University, Tokyo. His research primarily focuses on higher education policies and practices related to internationalization and international student mobility from a comparative perspective. From the State University of New York at Buffalo, Ota received his Ed.M. and Ph.D. in Social Foundations of Education with a dual title in Comparative and Global Studies in Education. He was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study international education administration in the U.S. in 1996 and was invited by Harvard-Yenching Institute as a Visiting Scholar from 2023-24.

Stefanie Sauer, a qualified social worker and social pedagogue with a PhD in educational science, is a professor of social work methods at the Evangelical University of Applied Sciences Berlin. Her work and research focuses on families, migration, and counseling. She is currently conducting a research on migrants from Vietnam to Germany.