About me

Date of birth: October 28, 1957
Nationality: Norwegian
Family: Married to Marith Helene, father of Stian, Andrea, and Aleksander Marciano
Languages: Norwegian (mother tongue), Swedish and Danish (understand written and spoken), English (excellent written and spoken), German, French, and Portuguese (understand some)

Brief curriculum vitae

I'm Doctor of Education from the Pennsylvania State University, Department of Adult Education and Instructional Systems in 1998, and Master of Science in Engineering from the Norwegian Institute of Technology (The University of Trondheim), Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in 1980.
I was appointed Adjunct Professor, at the Athabasca University, Centre for Distance Education in 1999. In 2003, I was re-appointed Adjunct Professor for a new three year period.
I'm regional editor for IRRODL (The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning) and EURODL (The European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning). I'm also on the Editorial Board of seminar.net.
I have worked with online education since 1986. I designed the EKKO computer conferencing and LMS system for distance education and initiated the NKI Internet College in 1987. This college was probably the first European online college, and few (if any) online colleges in the world has been longer in continouos operation.
I established The Distance Education Online Symposium (DEOS), when I worked with the American Center for the Study of Distance Education at The Pennsylvania State University. I was the founding editor of DEOSNEWS and the first moderator of DEOS-L. My dissertation was on "Teaching Techniques for Computer-mediated Communication". This research included a survey of 150 online teachers in 30 countries.
I have given a number of Keynote presentations and more than 50 other presentations at international conferences. I have published a large number of papers and edited more than twenty major books and reports about online education.

Work History

1992 - present. NKI Distance Education, Program Director, Director of Development and Professor. Associated to The Norwegian School of Information Technology (NITH).
1990 - 1992. Doctoral Student at Pennsylvania State University, Editor of DEOS, and Graduate Assistant at the American Center for the Study of Distance Education.
1989 - 1990. The NKI College of Computer Science, Project Manager for the development, implementation and operation of "The NKI Electronic College".
1986 - 1989. The NKI College of Computer Science, Assistant Professor. Part-time engaged as Project Manager for the EKKO-project, i.e. development, implementation and operation of a computer mediated conferencing system for distance education.
1983 - 1986. The NKI College of Computer Science, Supervisor. Responsible for school-administrative tasks.
1982 - 1983. NKI, Project Manager for the Information Technology project. Responsible for initiation and development of Information Technology courses and programs. Among these were the Computer Summer School and the NKI College of Computer Science.
1981 - 1982. Military service in the Norwegian Navy. Serving as Quartermaster and teacher at the SMK Technical Vocational School.
1980 - 1981. A/S Mycron, hardware development of the Intel 8086 based microcomputer Mycron 2000. Initially as a student, working on the Diploma Thesis, later as an employee.

Short-time engagements while studying

• Winter 1979: Norsk Data A/S, programming a project-management system, using FORTRAN and SIBAS database handling system.
• Summer 1979: A/S Norsk Elektrisk & Brown Boveri, assembly and maintenance of electrical engines and generators.
• Summer 1978: The Norwegian PTT, testing data-transmission quality on public telephone lines.
• Summer 1977: Osram A/S, working in a warehouse.