University of Gothenburg
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Thomas Hillman

Professor

Department of Applied IT, div CLIC
Telephone
+46 31-786 22 05
+46 766-18 22 05
Mail
thomas.hillman@ait.gu.se
Visiting address
Forskningsgången 6
417 56 Göteborg
Postal address
Box 100
412 96 Göteborg

Deputy Head of Department

Department of Applied Information Technology
Telephone
+46 31-786 22 05
+46 766-18 22 05
Mail
thomas.hillman@ait.gu.se
Visiting address
Forskningsgången 6
417 56 Göteborg
Postal address
Box 100
412 96 Göteborg

About Thomas Hillman

Thomas Hillman is Professor of Applied IT for Education. His main interest is the relationship between digitalisation and knowledge. His research aims to understand changes to how we learn when technologies transform how we produce, gain access to, and work with knowledge. This aim is pursued through the examination of knowledge processes on online digital platforms used by millions of people. Learning with these platforms is shaped by both the design of the technology and the practices that develop when the technology is used. Thomas examines platforms in many different contexts, from the social media used by people who want to discuss a topic to the platforms used in schools to organize the work of teachers and students. In each context, the conditions for learning change as the technology changes and with these changes new opportunities and problems arise. The details of how we design and use digital platforms make the difference between, for example, increasing access to knowledge or creating more inequality. With the increasing use of digital platforms and automation through artificial intelligence, the need for research that can improve the design, application and use of technologies used for learning is growing.

Thomas has a professional background as an industrial and interaction designer and defended his dissertation on the cycle of constant design and redesign through which educational technologies shape and are shaped by learning processes at the University of Ottawa in Canada, 2011. He came to the Faculty of Education at the University of Gothenburg as a postdoctoral fellow and has been a visiting fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford. Since 2019, he has been employed at the Department of Applied Information Technology where he is a full professor and deputy head of department.

Online talks, lectures, and walkthroughs

https://www.youtube.com/@thomashillman

Supervision

I supervise students with interests in areas such as learning at scale, digital knowledge infrastructures, and human-centered artificial intelligence. All requests for supervision at the bachelor or master's level should go through the course leader of the thesis course in the relevant program. All PhD opportunities are posted centrally on the university's recruitment page.

Research projects