IAFOR > The Southeast Asian Conference on Education (SEACE) > SEACE > Speakers

Speakers

Speakers will provide a variety of perspectives from different academic and professional backgrounds. This page provides information about presenters. For details of presentations and other programming, please visit the Programme page.

Speakers

  • Gary Ador Dionisio
    Gary Ador Dionisio
    De La Salle University, Philippines
  • Jose Epimaco R. Arcega
    Jose Epimaco R. Arcega
    Central Luzon State University (CLSU), Philippines
  • Shantanu Bhattacharya
    Shantanu Bhattacharya
    Singapore Management University (SMU), Singapore
  • Joseph Haldane
    Joseph Haldane
    The International Academic Forum (IAFOR), Japan
  • Gabrielle Iglesias
    Gabrielle Iglesias
    De La Salle University, Philippines
  • Floper Gershwin Manuel
    Floper Gershwin Manuel
    Central Luzon State University (CLSU), Philippines
  • Sherwin E. Ona
    Sherwin E. Ona
    De La Salle University, Philippines
  • Haruko Satoh
    Haruko Satoh
    Osaka University, Japan
  • Allen Surla
    Allen Surla
    De La Salle University, Philippines
  • Melanie Tolentino
    Melanie Tolentino
    Central Luzon State University, Philippines

Previous Speakers

View details of speakers at past SEACE conferences via the links below.

SEACE2021 SEACE2020
Gary Ador Dionisio
De La Salle University, Philippines

Biography

Dr Gary G. Ador Dionisio has been the Dean of the De La Salle – College of Saint Benilde School of Diplomacy and Governance (BENILDE) since 2019. Prior to his deanship, Dr Ador Dionisio was the Program Chairperson of the Consular and Diplomatic Affairs Program.
Dr Ador Dionisio was appointed by the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) as a Technical Evaluator for Public Administration and Governance programs of the State Universities and Colleges (SUCs). At the same time, he was selected as the Project Manager of the CHED and Benilde Business Continuity Plan for State Universities and Colleges.

Dr Ador Dionisio has written, presented, and moderated various papers with themes on Governance and Public Administration, Public Policy, Civil Society Participations, International Relations and Diplomacy and International Political Economy to national and international conferences in the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Indonesia, China, Senegal, Spain, Italy, and the USA.

Dr Ador Dionisio is also an occasional speaker at the Department of National Defense (DND), Armed Forces of the Philippines – Command General Service Staff College. Recently, he was conferred as a Fellow of the Philippine Public Safety College (PPSC) and Subject Matter Expert at the Graduate School of Public Development and Management at the Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP).

Dr Ador Dionisio is also a Senior Consultant of the WR Consultancy Group which provides policy and strategic advice to government, civil society and business organizations.

Lastly, Dr Ador Dionisio was part of the Faculty Advisory Board of Creative Learning, a non-government organization based in Washington, DC, USA from 2014 to 2018. He now sits as Board of Director of the Washington Global Institute (WGI), a learning institute that collaborates with various universities and colleges in Asia and the Pacific that provide capacity building training on governance, international relations and security. The Washington Global Institute has offices in Washington, DC, USA and London, UK.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Enhancing Resilience in Higher Education: The Philippine Experience
Jose Epimaco R. Arcega
Central Luzon State University (CLSU), Philippines

Biography

Jose Epimaco R. Arcega is an Instructor of the Department of Social Sciences at Central Luzon State University (CLSU), Philippines. He is also the current secretary of the Academic Research Council (ARC) and Ethics Research Committee of the University. He received his BA in Social Sciences at CLSU and MA in Sociology from Wesleyan University, Philippines. His research interests are political sociology, sports sociology, and family values. He has presented papers in international conferences.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Challenges and Innovations in Learning: Post-pandemic Reflections
Shantanu Bhattacharya
Singapore Management University (SMU), Singapore

Biography

Shantanu is Professor of Operations Management at SMU, Associate Dean of MBA, EMBA and DBA Programmes and Academic Director of the EMBA, DBA and DINN Programmes.

His teaching and research interests are in the areas of supply chain management, innovation and new product development, project management, services management, data analytics, design thinking, business model innovation and change management. He has consulted for GSK, IBM, Pepperl Fuchs, MAS Holdings and other firms and consortia, and has served on the advisory board and taught executive development programmes for many firms.

He has been recognized for his excellence in teaching and has won the Best Professor award in the SMU Executive Education Division in 2017, in the IE-SMU MBA programme in 2017, and has been nominated for the Best Core Professor at INSEAD twice, and has been on the Dean's List of Teaching at SMU in 2016 and 2017. His research has been published in top business journals in different disciplines.

Keynote Presentation (2023) | TBA
Joseph Haldane
The International Academic Forum (IAFOR), Japan

Biography

Joseph Haldane is the Founder, Chairman and CEO of IAFOR. He is responsible for devising strategy, setting policies, forging institutional partnerships, implementing projects, and overseeing the organisation’s business and academic operations, including research, publications and events.

Dr Haldane holds a PhD from the University of London in 19th-century French Studies, and has had full-time faculty positions at the University of Paris XII Paris-Est Créteil (France), Sciences Po Paris (France), and Nagoya University of Commerce and Business (Japan), as well as visiting positions at the French Press Institute in the University of Paris II Panthéon-Assas (France), The School of Journalism at Sciences Po Paris (France), and the School of Journalism at Moscow State University (Russia).

Dr Haldane’s research and teaching is on history, politics, international affairs and international education, as well as governance and decision making. Since 2015 he has been a Guest Professor at The Osaka School of International Public Policy (OSIPP) at Osaka University, where he teaches on the postgraduate Global Governance Course, and is Co-Director of the OSIPP-IAFOR Research Centre, an interdisciplinary think tank situated within Osaka University.

A Member of the World Economic Forum’s Expert Network for Global Governance, Dr Haldane is also a Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Philology at the University of Belgrade (Serbia), a Visiting Professor at the School of Business at Doshisha University (Japan), where he teaches Ethics and Governance on the MBA programme, and a Member of the International Advisory Council of the Department of Educational Foundations at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa’s College of Education (USA), collaborating on the development of the Global PhD programme.

Dr Haldane has given invited lectures and presentations to universities and conferences around the world, including at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, and advised universities, NGOs and governments on issues relating to international education policy, public-private partnerships, and multi-stakeholder forums. He was the project lead on the 2019 Kansai Resilience Forum, held by the Japanese Government through the Prime Minister’s Office and the Cabinet Office in collaboration with IAFOR.

From 2012 to 2014, Dr Haldane served as Treasurer of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan (Chubu Region) and he is currently a Trustee of the HOPE International Development Agency (Japan). He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society in 2012, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2015.

Gabrielle Iglesias
De La Salle University, Philippines

Biography

Ms Gabrielle Iglesias is a Capacity Building Specialist in Disaster Risk Management and Climate Change Adaptation, and an international consultant who works towards raising organizational capacities for disaster risk management and climate change adaptation. She has more than fifteen years of experience in supporting climate resilience, and is currently the Business Continuity Planning Lead for the Philippine Commission on Higher Education’s project to encourage business continuity planning by institutions of higher learning. Ms Iglesias has worked in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, the Philippines, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam. She worked for the United Nations (South Korea), the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (Thailand), the Southeast Asia One Health University Network (Thailand), and was a tenured assistant professor of public administration at the University of the Philippines.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Enhancing Resilience in Higher Education: The Philippine Experience
Floper Gershwin Manuel
Central Luzon State University (CLSU), Philippines

Biography

Floper Gershwin Manuel is currently an Assistant Professor at the Social Sciences Department of the Central Luzon State University, Philippines. He also serves as the Head of the University’s Center for Central Luzon Studies, which manages the CLSU Agricultural Museum. His research focuses on rural and agricultural communities, gender studies, youth, and heritage and museum studies. Previously, he has worked as a Science Research Specialist (Social Anthropologist) for the Philippine Rice Research Institute, where he explored rice farmers and farming community dynamics in the Philippines. He finished his BA in Social Science at the University of the Philippines and his Master of Community Development at Benguet State University. He is an active member of the International Council on Museums (ICOM).

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Challenges and Innovations in Learning: Post-pandemic Reflections
Sherwin E. Ona
De La Salle University, Philippines

Biography

Sherwin E. Ona, PhD is an associate professor and former chairperson of the Political Science and Development Studies Department of De La Salle University. His expertise and interest are in the areas of human security, non-traditional threats, cyber defense policies, and digital transformation. Dr Ona served as ICT consultant to various government agencies such as the Commission on Higher Education and the Department of Information and Communications Technology, among others. He has also worked with international organizations like the United Nations-Asia Pacific Center for ICT for Development (UN-APCICT), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Australian Awards, the Web Foundation, the British Council, and the Swedish Program for ICT in Developing Regions (SPIDER). Dr Ona’s writings and commentaries have appeared in online periodicals The Geopolitics and Analyzing War, as well as books, journals, and broadsheets.

Dr Ona is a senior fellow of the Philippine Public Safety College and the Stratbase-Albert Del Rosario Institute. He is also a module director for the Cyber Strategy and Policy Program of the National Defense College of the Philippines.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Enhancing Resilience in Higher Education: The Philippine Experience
Haruko Satoh
Osaka University, Japan

Biography

Haruko Satoh is Specially Appointed Professor at the Osaka School of International Public Policy (OSIPP), where she teaches Japan’s relations with Asia and identity in international relations. She is also co-director of the OSIPP-IAFOR Research Centre and she was previously part of the MEXT Reinventing Japan project on “Peace and Human Security in Asia (PAHSA)” with six Southeast Asian and four Japanese universities.

In the past she has worked at the Japan Institute of International Affairs (JIIA), Chatham House, and Gaiko Forum. Her interests are primarily in state theory, Japanese nationalism and identity politics. Recent publications include: “China in Japan’s Nation-state Identity” in James DJ Brown & Jeff Kingston (eds) Japan’s Foreign Relations in Asia (Routledge, 2018); “Japan’s ‘Postmodern’ Possibility with China: A View from Kansai” in Lam Peng Er (ed), China-Japan Relations in the 21st Century (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017); “Rethinking Security in Japan: In Search of a Post-‘Postwar’ Narrative” in Jain & Lam (Eds.), Japan’s Strategic Challenges in a Changing Regional Environment (World Scientific, 2012); “Through the Looking-glass: China’s Rise as Seen from Japan”, (co-authored with Toshiya Hoshino), Journal of Asian Public Policy, 5(2), 181–198, (July 2012); “Post- 3.11 Japan: A Matter of Restoring Trust?”, ISPI Analysis No. 83 (December 2011); “Legitimacy Deficit in Japan: The Road to True Popular Sovereignty” in Kane, Loy & Patapan (Eds.), Political Legitimacy in Asia: New Leadership Challenges (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), “Japan: Re-engaging with China Meaningfully” in Tang, Li & Acharya (eds), Living with China: Regional States and China through Crises and Turning Points, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

Professor Satoh is a member of IAFOR’s Academic Governing Board. She is Chair of the Politics, Law & International Relations section of the International Academic Advisory Board.

Plenary Panel Presentation (2020) | Education in Southeast Asia: Crossroads of Geopolitics, Economic Development and Democracy
Allen Surla
De La Salle University, Philippines

Biography

Allen Surla is an Assistant Professor of the Political Science & Development Studies Department of De La Salle University in Manila, Philippines. He was former Director for Information Technology of DLSU and former Assistant Dean for External Affairs and Internationalization of the College of Liberal Arts.

He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of the Philippines in 1991 and became a consultant for the Department of Budget and Management with concurrent responsibilities at the Presidential Task Force on Mt. Pinatubo.

In 1993, Surla went to the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok for his MS Science degree in Urban Planning. This led him to becoming part of a group that carried out the Mindanao Development Framework Plan under the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). He also conducted research for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations on the agricultural land markets in the Philippines.

His urban planning background helped him to become one of the builders of the first Cyber City in the Philippines, which is located at the former US base in Clark Field, Pampanga.

He is also doing consultancy work for both local and international organizations, with particular focus on ICT and local governance. He is currently involved in the training of State Universities and Colleges (SUCS) in the Philippines towards developing their Business Continuity Plans.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Enhancing Resilience in Higher Education: The Philippine Experience
Melanie Tolentino
Central Luzon State University, Philippines

Biography

Melanie Tolentino is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Central Luzon State University, Philippines, where she teaches social research methods, data analysis for social sciences, population problems and analysis, and sociology of institutions. She holds a doctorate in Sociology from De La Salle University. Her research interests focus on social capital, mixed-method design, education, and population aging with a specific emphasis on social aspects of health. She has published research articles in the Asia-Pacific Social Science Review, an internationally refereed and Scopus-indexed journal. She is also engaged in various research projects in agriculture, gender and development, and science and technology funded by national and international institutions. Tolentino has also completed short-term programs in Japan; the first was on peace and human security at Nagasaki University, and the second was on global health issues at Hokkaido University.

Featured Panel Presentation (2023) | Challenges and Innovations in Learning: Post-pandemic Reflections
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