Hello! I’m Dr. Shibani Antonette, Lecturer in TD (TransDisciplinary) School, University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Australia, where I teach in the Master of Data Science and Innovation course. I obtained my PhD in Learning Analytics at the Connected Intelligence Centre, UTS. My first and last names might appear differently across places (but it’s a story for another time), call me Shibani!
As modern computing technologies progress towards automation and improved efficiency, there is an increasing opportunity to harness them for social good. A computer science engineer by training, I develop applied technologies that can transform real-life practices. My research is in the field of ‘Learning Analytics’ (Artificial Intelligence in Education) where we apply analytic techniques to understand and improve educational practice.
In my work cutting across the fields of data science and education, I build computational systems making use of data analytics (text analytics and Natural Language Processing/NLP in particular), to improve teaching and learning contexts. My expertise is in ‘Writing Analytics’ where my work involved developing tools that provide automated feedback on students’ writing and making use of NLP techniques to study the process of writing. I have also worked on text mining and machine learning to automatically identify teamwork dimensions from online chat logs of students. I study how these technologies are integrated in the classroom to examine their potential impact on students. I believe that technical advancement by itself is not of immense value for learning, until and unless it actually impacts the educational context.
Having established a strong research profile in the field of Learning Analytics, I have presented my work at various international conferences, and have delivered talks and panel discussions across institutions. I have been an invited program committee member and reviewer for conferences and peer-reviewed journals. Details of the publications and research leadership can be found in the Research section of my blog. I am a recipient of the Future Women Leaders Conference Award, 2019 for early career female leaders in academia who are actively involved in the fields of Engineering and IT, and the ACM-W scholarship award from the Association of Computing Machinery, New York for Women in Computing. I have been recognized as one of Australia’s rising WiDS Stars (WiDS=Women in Data Science) by the Australian Data Science Network in 2023.
I served as an elected executive committee member of the Society for Learning Analytics Research SOLAR from 2019 – 2023 and founded the Special Interest Group on Writing Analytics. I co-host the SoLAR Spotlight- Conversations on Learning Analytics podcast series, disseminating leading research among the wider community. (Check out Episode 18: Explainable models for Learning Analytics, Episode 12: Learning Analytics Practitioners and Practice, Episode 09: 21st Century Skills and Learning Analytics, Episode 06: Privacy and Ethics in Learning Analytics, Episode 03: Giving a voice to stakeholders in Learning Analytics Design, Episode 01: Learning Analytics – Past, Present, and Future).
In another world, I’m the mom of a toddler who likes to keep me on my toes 🙂
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