Mairéad Pratschke

Mairéad Pratschke has been working at the intersection of digital technology and education for 25 years, as an academic researcher, learning designer, consultant, author and speaker. Her career has straddled the worlds of higher and further education, education technology, professional and executive education, lifelong learning and edtech start-ups.  

Irish born and raised in Canada, Mairéad has worked in the USA, Canada, the UK, Belgium, Spain and Ireland. Author of Generative AI and Education, she is focused on the impact of AI on our societies, economies and political cultures; on the future of work and learning; and on how to meet the challenges and opportunities that this wave of technological change presents. She has delivered keynote talks on generative AI, digital education and the future of work and learning in Canada, the USA, the UK, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, South Africa and Singapore.  

Mairéad is SALC Chair in Digital Education in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Manchester; Visiting Professor at Abertay University in Scotland and at the Data Science Institute at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE); and Research Fellow at the USA’s National AI Institute for Adult Education and Online Learning (AI-ALOE). She also serves as an advisor to several institutions. She is a member of the AI-ALOE External Advisory Board (EAB), the Digital Learning Institute (DLI)’s Industry Advisory Council and the Government of Portugal’s National Council on Pedagogical Innovation in Higher Education.  

Mairéad holds a PhD in History from McMaster University in Canada and a master’s degree in European Studies from KU Leuven in Belgium, focusing on European politics, policy and identity. She began her professional career in Brussels, Belgium, working for two European committees and later created the first online courses in European Studies for her alma mater in Canada.  

Her first book, Visions of Ireland, is on the visual representation of identity and the use of modern media as a vehicle for language revival. She is multi-lingual, and a citizen of Ireland, the European Union and Canada.

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