Higher Education

Meet the OEB22 Speakers: Keynote Rikke Toft Nørgård

Rikke Toft NørgårdAarhus (DK), November 2022 - Rikke is an Associate Professor at Aarhus University’s School of Education and coordinator for the MA in ICT-based educational design in Denmark. She is involved with countless pedagogical and humanitarian projects, is an active member of multiple higher education societies and is a board member of the Philosophy and Theory of Higher Education Society. Rikke has an impressive background in both EdTech and the humanities, and we are delighted about her involvement in the OEB Conference in November. Meet the person behind the speaker with this exclusive interview with Rikke.

Who, or what, was your most important teacher?

Rikke Toft Nørgård: As a child, it was nature, the sun, the earth, my family and the farm where I grew up. As a tween, it was stacks and stacks of books, comics, music and my Commodore 64, and as a young person, it was poetry, photography and the people who believed in me as a person.

What was your most important lesson?

Rikke Toft Nørgård: You don’t need to have a plan for your future as long as you are able to follow your heart and have faith in the future – The heart might change its mind multiple times and the future might be unexpected – And the future and your heart might take you to unexpected places. But those places will have meaning and value – As long as your future has a wide horizon and not a narrow path. Or, put in more ‘nihilistic’ terms – Nothing matters (that much) besides living a life worth living and having fun along the way…and you are the only one that gets to decide what that means and how that looks for you.

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