Introduction
Dr Samantha-Kaye Johnston is currently a research academic at The University of Oxford Centre for Educational Assessment (OUCEA) and a research affiliate at the Berkman Klein Centre for Internet and Society at Harvard University. Through her research dissemination efforts, she has engaged with over 300 educational stakeholders in 33 countries to deliver workshops on the science of learning and reading, including the re-imagination of technology to advance learning outcomes. Through this experience, she has learned that students, particularly those in under-resourced contexts, are concerned that they are not sufficiently ready for future opportunities. Therefore, her current research has been focused on two research strands: (1) strengthening the development of 21st century skills among youth and (2) elevating the voices of youth in their engagement with technology. In Research Strand 1, she studies the development of a range of skills, including critical thinking and critical reading, creativity, and curiosity. To this end, Dr Johnston adopts a multi-method approach, including data collection from education technology roundtables, video recordings, interviews, policy documents, experimental tasks, and pre-validated measures to study the teaching and assessment of these skills. In Research Strand 2, she employs a range of participatory approaches to co-design critical thinking resources with students to support safe engagement with technology.