Our Speakers

Andreas Schleicher, Director of Education and Skills, and Special Advisor on Education Policy to the Secretary-General at OECD

Andreas Schleicher is Director for Education and Skills, and Special Advisor on Education Policy to the Secretary-General at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). He initiated and oversees the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and other international instruments which create a global platform for policy-makers, researchers and educators to innovate and transform educational policies and practices.

He has worked for over 20 years with Ministers and educational leaders around the world to improve quality and equity in education. U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said about Andreas in The Atlantic (7/2011) that “He understands the global issues and challenges as well as or better than anyone I’ve met, and he tells me the truth”. Secretary of State Michael Gove in the United Kingdom called Andreas “the most important man in English education”, never mind that he is German and lives in France. Andreas is the recipient of numerous honours and awards, including the “Theodor Heuss” prize, awarded for “exemplary democratic engagement” in the name of the first president of the Federal Republic of Germany. He holds an honorary professorship at the University of Heidelberg.

Anneli Rautiainen, Head of Innovation Unit at Finnish National Agency for Education

Anneli Rautiainen, Master of Education, has graduated from Helsinki University in Finland. She has had a long career in education at school and district levels as a teacher, vice principal and principal. She has worked at the Finnish National Agency for Education for the past seven years. Her responsibilities have included leading, as a head of unit, the development of pre-primary and basic education, professional development of education personnel, and in addition Early Childhood Education and Care. Presently she is the head of Innovation Centre at the FNAE.

The Innovation Centre is a part of a larger transformation effort towards more nimble governance at the national and the local level – with the goal of being able to provide better services through experimentation and piloting. The Centre is the first agency-level innovation unit in Finland, an experiment in and of itself. The tenure is 2017-2020.

Mrs. Rautiainen has been a keynote speaker and panelist in over 25 countries and five continents at various international conventions. She has been a member of international education networks; ISC, GELP, NPDL, ITE and ARC. She is a member of OECD Education 2030 working group.   

Johnathan Rochelle, Project Management Director in Google Cloud and Google for Education

Jonathan Rochelle (aka JR) is an entrepreneur and technology product manager. He is currently Director of Product Management at Google and one of the original co-founders of many Google Apps, including Google Sheets, Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Slides, Google Drawings, Google Forms, Google Apps Script, Google Fonts, the new Google Sites, Google Classroom and Google Jamboard. Jonathan led product development for these collaborative apps in G Suite from inception, through their first 8 years (from 2005 until 2013), which are now used actively by almost 1 billion people. He is the co-inventor on several patents related to real-time collaboration in productivity apps which was at the core of the G Suite apps he helped launch.

Jonathan more recently started up the Google Apps for Education product team - leading the launches of Google Classroom, Google Expeditions and Google Forms & Quizzes, as well as the Jamboard product team, which is a set of collaborative whiteboard apps and a touch-screen hardware device, announced in October, 2016, launched in May 2017.

Google Apps for Education is used actively by more than 80 million educators and students, globally (as of Nov 2017) and Google Classroom is actively used by 30 million, including one in three US K12 students (as of 2017). Jonathan and his teams are primarily based in Google's NYC office.

He is easily reached on Twitter as @JRochelle.

Amanda Timberg, Head of Talent and Outreach Programs, EMEA, Google

Amanda is Head of Talent & Outreach Programs - EMEA for Google, working to build a diverse pipeline of future technologists through campus outreach, student development, internships and entry level hiring. Prior to Google Amanda spent ten years at the education charity Teach First, most recently as Executive Director of Programmes. An alumnus of Teach For America, Amanda taught primary school in Compton, California and worked at Teach For America and the Los Angeles Unified School District in southern California.

Amanda sits on the charity boards of Ambition School Leadership and Achievement for All and holds an MsC in Voluntary Sector Management from Cass Business School.  

John Vamvakitis, International Director of Google for Education

 John is the Director of Google for Education International, responsible for leading sales teams, developing business strategy and identifying new growth opportunities in EMEA, APAC and LATAM. He originally joined Google in 2011 as Director of Partnership for YouTube in APAC where he launched the Sport/Leisure segment vertical in the region.

John joined Google from ESPN where he held the positions of VP Strategy & Business Development and VP Acquisitions & Programming. His responsibilities ranged from conceiving and launching new networks, such as the first ESPN HD channel in Asia; to negotiating long term partnerships with the world’s leading sport federations and government institutions. Prior to ESPN, John spent spent 5 years at the Walt Disney Company where he focused on accelerating the growth of The Disney Channel along with launching new networks under the Disney/ABC brand.

John holds a BA degree in Economics/Management from the University of California which he completed in 3.3 years and an MBA from the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University

More speakers to come, please check back!