Yasmin Kafai

Yasmin Kafai is Professor of Learning Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. She is a researcher and developer of online tools and communities to promote computational participation, crafting, and creativity across K-16. Her book publications include “Connected Code: Why Children Need to Learn Programming,” (2014) and “Connected Gaming: What Making Video Games Can Teach Us About Learning and Literacy” (2016, both by MIT Press) as well as several edited volumes such as “Textile Messages: Dispatches from the World of Electronic Textiles and Education”, and “Diversifying Barbie and Mortal Kombat: Intersectional Perspectives and Inclusive Designs for Gaming.” She coauthored the 2010 National Educational Technology Plan for the United States Department of Education, wrote the 2006 synthesis report “Under the Microscope: A Decade of Gender Equity Projects in the Sciences” for the American Association of University Women, and was a contributing member to the National Research Council workshop series “Computational Thinking for Everyone.” Kafai earned a doctorate from Harvard University while working with Seymour Papert at the MIT Media Lab. She is an elected Fellow of the American Educational Research Association and past President of the International Society for the Learning Sciences.