President
Tony Bates Associates Ltd.,
Vancouver, Canada
e-mail: tony.bates@ubc.ca

 

Tony Bates is President and CEO of Tony Bates Associates Ltd, a private company specializing in consultancy and training in the planning and management of e-learning and distance education. He is also part-time Chair of Research into e-Learning at the Open University of Catalonia in Barcelona, Spain. He is also on the Academic Advisory Board of the Volkswagen Auto Uni, based in Germany.

He was Director of Distance Education and Technology in the Continuing Studies Division of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada from 1995 to 2003 and also Research Team Leader of MAPLE, the Centre for Research into Managing and Planning Learning Environments in Education at UBC.
From 1990 to 1995, he was Executive Director, Research, Strategic Planning, and Information Technology at the Open Learning Agency of British Columbia. Prior to that, he was Professor of Educational Media Research at the British Open University, where he worked for 20 years as one of the founding members of staff.

He is the author of eight books, including 'Managing Technological Change: Strategies for College and Universities Leaders', and (with Gary Poole) 'Effective Teaching with Technology in Higher Education', both published by Jossey-Bass. His research groups at the UKOU, OLA and UBC published over 350 papers in the area of distance education and the use of technology for teaching. He is on the editorial board of six journals specializing in distance education and educational technology.

He has worked as a consultant in over 30 countries. Clients include the World Bank, OECD, UNESCO, national ministries of education, and several U.S. state higher education commissions.

He has a Ph.D. in educational administration from the University of London, England. He was awarded the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa by the Open University of Portugal in 1995, Doctor of Letters, Honoris Causa, from Laurentian University, Canada, in 2001, and Doctor Honoris Causa from Athabasca University, in June 2004.