Scholarship · Inquiry · Practice
Scholarship
Research and reflection at the intersection of faith, trauma, and the craft of learning design.
From My UBC Faculty
I completed UBC’s Master of Educational Technology with an A+ average (92.9%), earning an A+ in eight of my nine graded courses. Here’s what three of my instructors said along the way.
Jennifer Shapka, PhD
Associate Professor, Faculty of Education · University of British Columbia
“You did a fantastic job. I’m giving out one of my very elusive fives to you. I don’t give that grade out very often. Congratulations… I think you really nailed all aspects of that.”
Diane Janes, PhD
MET Instructor, Constructivist Strategies for E-Learning · University of British Columbia
“Clear, concise and easy to read… good use of sources and solid use of APA (actually quite rare, so good job)… I wanted a more critical approach in your discussion and you did that, with your own thinking mixed throughout.”
Matiul Alam, PhD
Educator, e-Learning Specialist, NGO Leader and Speaker · University of British Columbia
“Gary is an outstanding scholar in the fields of inclusive education, teacher education, instructional design and distance learning!”
From UBC Master of Educational Technology Work
Selected Papers
Research Proposal
Academia Meets Real Life
While working on one of my master’s courses (ETEC 500 — Research Methodologies in Education), I was blessed with the opportunity to base my final assignment on a real project I had recently undertaken at Hanyang University in Seoul, South Korea — redesigning and co-teaching a Basic Academic English (BAE) course.
The proposal examined the challenges of converting in-person courses into Blended Learning models, proposing specific research methodologies and a sample Screening Questionnaire for faculty and students.
Evolving Reflections: How My Thinking Changed
What I first argued. When I wrote this proposal, I believed the online portion of our redesigned course should have been fully interactive from the start, and I thought the decision makers had been too cautious.
What changed my mind. A later course on planning and managing technology in higher education (ETEC 520) showed me how strongly universities protect faculty autonomy, and how different that collegial culture is from the managerial side that runs budgets and operations. Cost pressures, new technology and student demand were all pushing my university toward blended learning, and that shift needed both cultures to work together.
What I’d do now. Looking back, the cautious first version was probably the wisest path. Pushing for a fully interactive redesign right away would likely have deepened faculty resistance to the whole initiative. I’ve kept both reflections because they show how my understanding grew, and if I were writing this proposal today, I’d rebuild it around what I learned.
A silent AI animation — Basic Academic English, Online
Essay 1
Pedagogy in the Age of Web 2.0
The impact of Web 2.0 technology and internet memes on learning design and learning.
- Imitation — a fundamental part of language acquisition and human development.
- Memes — units of cultural transmission, replicated and spread through imitation.
- Internet memes — evolved and mutated in the digital age, deliberately altered and shared.
- Web 2.0 — social media and online communities reshaping culture, society, and education.
- Digital literacy — essential for navigating the power and dangers of online communication.
Essay 2
From Objectivism to Constructivism
The evolution of a blended multimedia writing course — from traditional, objectivist design toward a constructivist learning experience.
- Impact of Web 2.0 — enabling rapid cultural transmission across education.
- Cultural inversion — deep connection despite physical distance.
- Digital-literacy challenges — helping students navigate online risk and think critically.
- Technological competence — re-educating reluctant teachers to use digital tools constructively.
Collaborative Paper · ETEC 520
Comparing Two Provinces
Postsecondary e-learning in Ontario and Alberta, co-written with Caroline Kim Moore for UBC’s course on planning and managing learning technologies in higher education. We compared how two very different provinces led, or failed to lead, online learning in their colleges and universities.
- Politics and funding — how decades of one-party rule in Alberta and a decade of Liberal government in Ontario shaped e-learning policy.
- Differentiation — Ontario’s push to reduce program duplication through Strategic Mandate Agreements.
- Collaboration at scale — eCampusAlberta grew for ten straight years and came to include all 26 of Alberta’s public institutions.
- Leadership gaps — Ontario’s planned province-wide online institute had yet to materialize, while some universities formed partnerships without the ministry.
AI-generated deep dive — the Lesson Plan Critique
Essay 3
Lesson Plan Critique
An AI-generated deep dive into my lesson-plan critique — the shift from behaviorist instruction to a dynamic, socially constructed learning environment, where strategic “architecting” turns a standard course into a thriving community of practice.
- Reframing diversity — student difference as a classroom asset, not a liability.
- Strategic scaffolding — placing “more knowledgeable others” within heterogeneous groups.
- Linguistic flexibility — native-language ‘inner speech’ enabling higher-order analysis.
- Distributed cognition — shared tools extending where knowledge is built and stored.
- Reflective growth — peer assessment advancing learners’ operative knowledge.
MET Research · ETEC 565M, 2015
Mobility in Blended Environments
For UBC’s Mobile & Open Education course, I published a first-person analysis as a short vodcast rather than a paper. The assignment called for a research piece built for mobile viewing and a global audience of ed-tech professionals. It looks back on my experience bringing mobile devices into blended classes at Hanyang University in Seoul. Once smartphones became affordable for most of my students, they made it easier to collaborate, protected student privacy, and gave the class a more democratic say in decisions.
What I left out of the video
Two practical drawbacks were cut to keep the vodcast short: battery life and Wi-Fi reliability. Students learned that arriving with a charged device was their responsibility. For connectivity, the fix was a backup tool (Google Forms instead of Socrative) or a non-Wi-Fi Plan B ready to go.
“My congrats once again for your inquisitive, original approach to scholarship and learning more broadly. Your students are fortunate… Your facility with digital tools is admirable, and your narrative is skillfully designed, extensively researched, and very professionally communicated. You have achieved an even, high quality of delivery, including for mobile devices. Very well done.”
David Vogt, PhD
MET Program Professor · University of British Columbia
MET Research · ETEC 565M Forecasting Project, 2015
A Forecast: Augmented Reality in Higher Education
For the same course, I was asked to forecast where a mobile technology was heading. Part 1 shows how I stumbled onto augmented reality in my own EFL classroom: beginner students used Google Translate to write English scripts together, and some stayed half an hour after class to finish. Part 2 builds on Bryan Alexander’s idea of a “second atmosphere” of digital content layered over physical space, and imagines it on my campus in Seoul, with audio walking tours for international students and live translation of lectures through earbuds.
Part 1 · The Backstory (3:31)
Part 2 · A Second Atmosphere (4:48)
Looking back from 2026: pointing a phone camera at text to translate it, and hearing live translation through earbuds, are now built into everyday devices. The forecast held up.
Shorter Provocations
Three Thought Papers on Objectivism, Empowerment & Constructivism
Classroom Management Effectiveness
Are behaviourist classroom-management techniques effective for higher-level learning?
Can Neuroscience Empower Teachers?
Does a basic understanding of neuroscience really increase the potential for empowering teachers?
Awarded one of Dr. Shapka’s “very elusive fives.” See her comment at the top of this page.
Truth, Knowledge & Constructivism
Do good test scores from behaviourist pedagogy relate more to training or to learning?
Bridging Theory & Practice
The scholarship on this page reflects a sustained commitment to pedagogy that places the person before the platform — learning architecture grounded in the belief that academic excellence, personal healing, and spiritual formation belong together, not in competition.
Whether examining the cultural currents of digital media or designing collaborative curriculum, the animating question is the same: How does this serve the whole person? For those called to redemptive education, that question is never merely pedagogical — it is missional.
I welcome conversation with colleagues exploring how these frameworks might address the challenges facing SDA higher education today.