Operations

President
Bruce N. Chaloux directs the 16-state Electronic Campus initiative of the Southern Regional Education Board. The Electronic Campus, the South's "electronic marketplace" for distance education courses and programs, has grown to include more than 10,000 credit courses and 500 degree programs from more than 300 colleges and universities in the region.
Prior to assuming his duties at the SREB in 1998, he served in the Graduate School at Virginia Tech for 13 years, including four years as Associate Dean for Extended Campus Programs at the institution’s main campus in Blacksburg and earlier for nine years as Associate Dean and Director of Tech’s Northern Virginia Graduate Campus in suburban Washington, DC. He earlier held positions on the staff of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia and as an academic affairs administrator and faculty member at Castleton State College (Vermont).
He has earned his Ph.D. in Higher Education Administration from Florida State University in 1979 and has business degrees from the University of Florida (master’s in 1972) and Castleton State College.

A. Frank Mayadas. Ph.D. At the Sloan Foundation, Dr. Mayadas is involved in a number of areas: online education, globalization of industries, industry studies, and career choice in technical fields. He started the Sloan online learning program in 1993. This program (known as Asynchronous Learning Networks or ALN) has had a profound impact in moving the field forward. Members of the Sloan Consortium now number over 1400. Dr. Mayadas has been a keynote speaker at several distance education conferences and has testified before Congress on web-based learning.

Executive Director, Ex-Officio member of the Board -
John R. Bourne, Ph.D. is Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Olin College, Professor of Technology Entrepreneurship at Babson College, and directs the Sloan Center for on OnLine Education at Olin and Babson Colleges. He was previously Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt University, where he had been on the faculty since 1969. He founded the Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks and remains as editor. He established the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation supported Asynchronous Learning Network (ALN) Web in 1996. In 2008, he incorporated Sloan-C as a non-profit corporation in the state of Massachusetts.

Chief Information Officer and Survey Director
Jeff Seaman, Ph.D. has worked in education information technology for over 20 years. In addition to teaching at such schools as Cornell, the University of Wisconsin, and the Wharton School, he has created and run information technology organizations for the University of Pennsylvania and Lesley University. The client list for his consulting company, Pondview Associates, includes schools such as Harvard, Tufts, Boston University, Brandeis, and the University of Pennsylvania and technology vendors including IBM and Microsoft. He has served on advisory boards for many technology companies, including Apple, Claris, IBM, Microsoft, and Word Perfect. His industry experience includes serving as Chief Technology Officer at HighWired.com where he led the development of an online learning system and as the Vice President of Engineering for Vista Associates where he did functional design work and led the engineering team. Dr. Seaman has degrees in Demography/Statistics, Sociology, Electrical Engineering, and Housing, all from Cornell University.

Director of Technical Operations
Martine Dawant is a Sloan consultant in private practice. M.S., Université Catholique de Louvain (Belgium). Her domain of work and research focuses on Asynchronous Learning Networks. She created and maintains the Sloan-C Web, a resource of information for online education practitioners and newcomers. She develops various web-based applications that support and distribute ALN knowledge and resources. She creates online workshops and seminars.

Associate Executive Director
Kathleen S. Ives, D.M. has worked in online technology for over 20 years and serves as The Sloan Consortium's Events Producer. Formerly, Dr. Ives oversaw all forms of alternative instruction at Quinsigamond Community College in Worcester, MA (distance learning, accelerated programming). She teaches online for University of Phoenix and Axia College of Western University, and in an accelerated enviornment for working adults at both Regis College in Weston, MA and the University of Phoenix, Greater Boston Campus. Dr. Ives began her career at CBS and helped to develop the service that evolved into Prodigy. She then spent fourteen years designing and implementing consumer online information services, first at AT&T and then at Verizon. Dr. Ives sits on the Massachusetts Department of Education's Distance Learning Advisory Board for Adult Basic Education. Dr. Ives has degrees in communication, communication management, and organizational leadership from the University of California at Davis, the University of Southern California, Annenberg School of Communication, and the University of Phoenix-Online, respectively.

Customer Service Coordinator
Gail Sullivan joined The Sloan Consortium, Inc. in the fall of 2006. In this capacity, Gail is primarily responsible for processing the registrations for membership, workshops and conferences as well as resolving issues raised by workshop participants and members. In her capacity as the assistant to the Director of Online Education, Dr. Kathleen S. Ives, Gail is the secondary contact person for our workshop facilitators. Along with our Marketing Associate, Joanna Tong, she is also responsible for fulfilling requests for publications. Gail has a Bachelor of Science degree from Northeastern University in Personnel and Industrial Relations and has been involved with Higher Education for approximately ten years.

Events Producer
Jennifer Rafferty, M.A. is an independent education consultant. She has worked in the field of distance education as both an instructor and administrator since 1998. Formerly, she managed the Massachusetts Adult Basic Education Distance Learning Project at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Jennifer has also consulted with the Massachusetts Department of Education for the development of distance education guidelines for state funded distance learning programs. She holds degrees from Mount Holyoke College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, respectively.

Events Producer
Jonathan Small serves E-Learning at the New England College of Finance (NECF) in Boston, MA. He is responsible for day-to-day management of NECFOnline including faculty and student support, course design and development, and the integration of new technologies for the college's academic programs. In late 2006 Small began consulting for the Sloan Consortium as their Web Events Producer. For Sloan-C he markets, designs and hosts workshops and training programs. Previously Small served as the E-Learning Program Manager for NECF. In this position he managed the administration of the college's online programs. Before joining the online department he served as a Marketing Coordinator and Student & Member Advisor fostering relationships with partner companies in the financial services industry. Mr. Small began his career at the Boston office of Agnew Carter/MS&L; an international public relations firm. Small is a graduate of the Pennsylvania State University where he received a degree in Communications.

Christine Geith, Ph.D.
Executive Director, MSU Global
Michigan State University

Christine Geith leads business strategy, product development and financial management as director of MSU Global at Michigan State University. She is a founder and co-executive director of the award-winning Horticulture Gardening Institute at MSU. Prior to joining MSU, Dr. Geith was executive director of eLearning at Rochester Institute of Technology where she was instrumental in launching one of the first online degree programs in the U.S. in 1991. An Arena Award recipient from the Center for Digital Education and senior associate of the TLT Group, Dr. Geith holds an MBA from Rochester Institute of Technology and Ph.D. in education administration, curriculum and instruction from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Stephen Schiffman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship
Babson College and Olin College

Stephen Schiffman has served in faculty and dean positions at Babson College since 1986. Under his leadership as Dean of the undergraduate program, Babson College received the 2002 Hesburgh Award for reinvention of undergraduate business education. Stephen’s research interests include entrepreneurship and the business issues of online education. His previous experience includes positions at Digital Equipment Corporation, Colorado College and University of Colorado-Boulder. Dr. Schiffman holds an M.S. from MIT in management and a Ph.D. from Dartmouth College in mathematics.

Karen Vignare
Director, MSU Global Ventures
Michigan State University

Karen Vignare is Director of MSU Global Ventures. She is responsible for growing globally accessible, innovative online customized professional development programs like the award winning Horticulture Gardening Institute. Karen joins MSU Global most recently from the Rochester Institute of Technology where she served as a Senior Research Analyst in Online Learning. Before RIT, Karen was an Assistant Professor for Retail, Marketing and Business Technologies at the State University of NY, Alfred. Her career began on Wall Street where she served as a Vice-President and Research Analyst for Political Economics. She is on the Advisory Board of National Telecommunications University Network and the editorial board of EdPath and Distance Education. Karen Vignare has an M.B.A from the Simon School at the University of Rochester and is currently enrolled in doctoral courses at Nova Southeastern University in Computer Technology for Education.

Linda Enghagen, J.D.
Linda Enghagen is an attorney and Associate Professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Her teaching career began in distance learning when she first taught Engineering Law & Ethics as part of the university’s Video Instructional Program in 1984. In 1990, she became the first woman to receive an Outstanding Instructor Award from National Technological University, which also offered her course. In 2002, she received a second Outstanding Teacher Award from the College of Food & Natural Resources at the University of Massachusetts.

Professor Enghagen teaches cyberlaw at both the graduate and undergraduate levels and developed a corporate training program entitled Information Technology and the Law: Software, the Internet and E-mail in conjunction with the PBS Business & Technology Network. Her scholarly contributions related to intellectual property are directed to the needs of faculty members. Her publications include two books, Technology and Higher Education: Approaching the 21st Century and Fair Use Guidelines for Educators, as well as numerous articles such as Fair Use in an Electronic World and Copyright Law and Fair Use—Why Ignorance Isn’t Bliss. She also developed a pamphlet entitled Educators, Technology and the Law: Common Questions/Direct Answers and a brochure entitled Legal Literacy in the Information Age—Ten (easy to understand) Rules of Thumb. In addition, she has been a guest commentator on a local NPR affiliate where she discussed copyright piracy in a piece entitled Napster Worries Me.