Mahesh Nath Parajuli is a Professor of Development Studies at the Kathmandu University School of Education. He was the Dean at the same School from 2015 to 2021. With nearly 40 years of experience working in education and development, mainly in the government ministry and academia, he has published several articles in national and international journals and book chapters on different aspects of education and development. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the journal, Journal of Education and Research, a publication of the Kathmandu University School of Education. He is also a member of the Academic Committee of the University Grants Commission, Nepal.
Areas of his expertise include education sociology, development studies, gender studies and feminism, policy and planning, and research methods. He has led several research projects and one of his currently ongoing research projects is about Technical and Vocational Education and Training. This project aims to analyze and understand the challenges in linking education, particularly the technical and vocational education sector and the labor market. Likewise, he is also leading a research project that aims to create learning for a quality TVET, ultimately becoming a model for the international community.
Ursula Renold is a Professor of Education Systems at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zürich and is Chairperson of the Centre on the Economics and Management of Education and Training Systems (CEMETS). She is also Chairman of the University Board of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Northwestern Switzerland, a member of the Research Advisory Council of the German Economic Institute in Cologne (Germany), the International Advisory Group at the Center on International Education Benchmarking (USA), the Pearson International Expert Panel (UK), Board of Trustees Committee member, Swisscontact, Zürich, and Commission for the Dual Education Law (Serbia). She was a Visiting Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (USA). She was also Director General (equal to Secretary of State in other countries) of the Federal Office for Professional Education and Technology (OPET) in the Department of Economic Affairs, Bern. In this position, she led Switzerland‘s competence center for professional education, universities of applied sciences, and innovation. In her research, she applies empirical methods, statistics, and theoretical concepts to the areas of comparative education and translational research with a specific focus on labour-market-oriented education and training.