Peter Henschel:
The Institute for Research on Learning (IRL) is unique in that it is one of the few non-profit organizations that examine what constitutes successful learning in the schools, workplace, and communities in a rigorous, interdisciplinary and collaborative manner. IRL's researchers represent a diverse array of fields, including education, anthropology, computer science, linguistics, cognitive science, sociology and psychology. Because of this diversity, IRL's methodologies are wholly unique, emphasizing research in action, participatory design, ethnography, and the creative use of video and video analysis.
Started as an outgrowth of research on cognition and artificial intelligence, IRL began operating as a non-profit institute in January of 1987 with the help of a major five-year grant from the Xerox Foundation. Founded in the wake of the national report, "A Nation At Risk," the decision to found IRL was predicated on the belief that a key missing link in the quest for first class schools and continuously innovative workplaces was a deep understanding of the critical elements of successful learning. Long the sole province of cognitive science, IRL's founders felt that significant progress could be made if multiple perspectives could be brought to the challenge, working together, in real world settings, with partners. Working in this manner, forging a fresh approach to R&D, IRL today has a staff of nearly fifty full and part time researchers, consultants, and support staff in its Menlo Park headquarters and throughout the United States. Into its tenth year, IRL continues its work along two core capabilities: "Learning to See Learning" (which builds on IRL's unique mix of field research methods) and "Designing for Learning" (creating tools, techniques and strategies that build continuous learning into schools and workplaces).
David Kearns, IRL's founder (former Chairman and CEO of Xerox, and Deputy Secretary of Education) once described IRL as having the "opportunity to significantly affect how we think about learning and what programs we put in place during the next decade."
William Clancey:
Brahms is a multiple-agent simulation tool for modeling work practice. Brahms differs from traditional business process modeling tools by representing activities of groups -- what people actually do -- not only tasks or technical operations. Work flow emerges through agent interactions, rather than being prespecified as procedures people are supposed to follow. A Brahms model is a kind of story with main characters and key events. The backbone of a model consists of communication through databases, conversations, meetings, etc. Models may highlight circumstantial interactions of people and technology, social relations, novice-expert differences, and spatial influences on behavior. Models may be developed for presentation and comparison of points of view, for what-if analysis, for teaching, for software requirements specification (modeling the context of use), and as a workbench for relating different levels of cognitive and social analysis. Initial applications are providing insights about the nature of knowledge variability in a work group, which is not necessarily a problem to be resolved by training, but a source for creativity and change.
Peter Henschel, Executive Director of the Institute for Research on Learning, got his M.P.P. in Public Policy from the University of California at Berkeley in 1973, and his B.A. in Government from Harvard College, Harvard University in 1971. Henschel came to the Institute for Research on Learning (IRL) in April 1991 after nearly three years in Britain, as Managing Director of "Business in the Cities" -a public-private partnership program to revitalize inner cities in the U.K. Led by Prince Charles, the project was designed to build long-term alliances between local business and political leaders in the service of common goals for distressed communities. Immediately prior to his work in London, Peter served as Deputy Mayor for Management and programs for the City and County of San Francisco. His career has centered on public sector management, human resources management and the creation of lasting partnerships and alliances in various settings. He comes to the world of learning research and development with a life-long dedication to the reform of K-12 education and to the creation of major improvements in the quality of work-life and the workplace.
William J. Clancey, a Senior Research Scientist at the Institute for Research on Learning, received a BA (Summa Cum Laude) in Mathematical Sciences from Rice University in 1974, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University in 1979. Involved in expert systems research in Stanford's Knowledge Systems Lab from the early days of the MYCIN Project in 1975, Clancey developed some of the earliest AI programs for explanation, the critiquing method of consultation, tutorial discourse, and student modeling. His work on "heuristic classification" and "model construction operators" has been influential in the design of expert systems and instructional programs. He has published five books, including: Knowledge-Based Tutoring (1987), Contemplating Minds: A Forum for Artificial Intelligence (1994, with S. Smoliar and M. Stefik), and Situated Cognition: On Human Knowledge and Computer Representations (1997). His recent publications re-examine the relation of descriptive cognitive theories to human experience and neural processes. He is especially interested in relating theories of human intelligence to animal cognition and evolution (Conceptual Coordination, in preparation).
Clancey has presented tutorials and keynote addresses in eighteen countries. He has been elected a Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics (1986) and of the American Association of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI). He was an AAAI Councilor, the first Editor-in-Chief of The AAAI Press, and Program Co-Chair of the AAAI 1996 National Conference. He is a Senior Editor of Cognitive Science and serves on several editorial boards, including Artificial Intelligence. Clancey also has experience in the practical application of AI technology as a co-founder of two companies; he has received several patents for his work in qualitative modeling. Currently, he is developing a program to simulate work practice, called Brahms, to be used in work systems design and instruction.