Sandra Milligan

Enterprise Professor Sandra Milligan serves as Executive Director of Melbourne Metrics and Director of the Assessment Research Centre at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, Faculty of Education, University of Melbourne. Appointed Director of the Assessment Research Centre in 2017, she brings extensive experience as a senior public servant, entrepreneur, publisher, and co-founder of the Good Universities Guide and the University of the Year Award. Her career encompasses management of private and public-private joint ventures and strategic partnerships in educational innovation. Milligan specializes in assessment research, combining measurement science with data analytics to address learning analytics, digital education, educational measurement, and instructional design. She co-leads New Metrics, a collaborative research venture between the University of Melbourne and partner schools, focusing on meta-problems in Australian education such as ensuring learners acquire essential skills, knowledge, attitudes, and values for an uncertain world shaped by artificial intelligence. She convened the University of Melbourne's Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills, which has enrolled over 30,000 teachers worldwide.

Milligan's contributions include leading the Melbourne Assessment team in partnerships with school leaders and the education industry. In 2023, she received the ACEL Gold Medal for her outstanding contribution to the study and practice of educational administration and leadership. She leads an Australian Research Council Linkage Project funded with $880,522 to redesign university admissions in Australia, developing a national model that matches school leavers' strengths and capabilities to tertiary courses while supporting disadvantaged students. Her key publications include 'Understanding learning and learning design in MOOCs: A measurement-based interpretation' (2016, Journal of Learning Analytics), 'Assessment in the age of artificial intelligence' (2022), 'Learning analytics and assessment: Emerging research trends, promises and future opportunities' (2023), and 'Standards for Developing Assessments of Learning Using Process Data' (2020). Her work influences policy, practice, and research in competency-based assessment, micro-credentialing, and alternatives to traditional metrics like ATAR and NAPLAN.