Liesel Ebersöhn

President of the World Educational Research Association (WERA), Director of the Centre for the Study of Resilience, Professor, University of Pretoria (South Africa)

Dr. Liesel Ebersöhn - a registered educational psychologist and expert on social dimensions of resilience, Director of Centre for the Study of Resilience, Full Professor in Department of Educational Psychology, University of Pretoria. She is the World Education Research Association President Elect. Ebersöhn is regarded as a leading scholar and teacher in resilience and resilience promoting interventions in high-risk school settings. Her research is positioned in contexts characteristic of an emerging economy, Global South country in transformation.

With students, co-researchers and as single author, Prof Ebersöhn has contributed 94 peer-reviewed articles, a monograph, numerous book chapters, as well as edited and co-authored books. In South Africa her research focus has had a decided impact on curricula for teacher training in several higher education institutions, as well as policy-level advances nationally for rural education and bilingual teaching and learning materials. Her teaching and research outputs attest that higher education can effectively integrate research, teaching and learning as well as community engagement.

Keynote report: Collective wellbeing mechanisms to enable quality education in unequal spaces – Afrocentric lessons