European Online Conference for eTwinning Schools 2023

Of Greek nationality, Anna-Maria Giannopoulou studied English Literature and Applied Linguistics at the University of Athens and Edinburgh and spent 20 years as a teacher, teacher trainer, university lecturer, director of studies and manager in secondary and tertiary educational institutions in the UK, Greece, Hungary and Belgium.

She began her career in the European Commission in 2003 and worked on policy coordination and briefings for the Commission President. In 2012, she joined the Directorate-General (DG) of Education, Youth, Sport and Culture where she has worked on human resources and school education policy.

Irene Pateraki is working as Pedagogical and Monitoring Manager in the European Schoolnet for the project eTwinning. She holds a Master's Degree in Multicultural Education and she has worked for several years as a kindergarten teacher. For six years, she was seconded in the Greek Ministry of Education and worked as pedagogical expert in the National Support Organization of eTwinning. She has also organized and facilitated several online courses, webinars, conferences and workshops for teachers from 44 countries. She has presented her work at various educational conferences.

Arianna Sala has a BSc and a PhD in Psychology (from the University of Florence and the University of Seville) and has been a postdoctoral researcher in Social Anthropology (Federal University of Santa Catarina, BR). She has been in charge of qualitative research projects in the field of education, gender studies and policy evaluation in several universities, public institutions, and International Organizations (such as UN Women and the OEI) in Spain and Brazil. At the JRC, she has been the first author of “LifeComp, the European Framework for the Personal, Social and Learning to learn Key Competence” and “LifeComp into Action: teaching Life skills in the classroom and beyond” focusing on the promotion of Socio-Emotional Competences through formal and non-formal education. Her current research interest lies in the impact of social media and online platforms’ use on adolescents’ well-being and mental health.

Dr. Laura Huhtinen-Hildén (Ph.D. MMus) works at Metropolia University of Applied Sciences as a principal lecturer and researcher (music education & creativity, arts and well-being) and as head of master’s degree programme Creativity and Arts in Social and Health fields. She also leads the currently launched cultural well-being research and education centre CuWeRE in Finland. Her research interests include pedagogically sensitive music education, developing professional knowledge and narrative as well as advancing well-being and health in and through creativity and arts related practices.

Dr. Mathilde (Macarena-Paz) Celume is lecturer and researcher in Psychology at Aix-Marseille Université, teaching differential psychology and research methods to undergraduate students. She also teaches at Université Paris-Cité for the Master Learning Sciences, and the Master Artistic Creation. Her research interests include the assessment and development of creativity and socio-emotional competencies, as well as their relationship to active pedagogies, such as drama pedagogy. She is also founder of EmotedLab, an organization that provides scientific solutions for action-research projects, and offers outreach conferences on social-emotional competencies.