Martin Siegel

Professor of Informatics, Professor of Cognitive Science, and Professor of Instructional Systems

Siegel is featured in ACUE’s Career Guidance and Readiness course.

Siegel is a Professor of Informatics, Instructional Systems Technology, and Cognitive Science. He recently served as the Director of Graduate Studies in Informatics. Prior to serving in this position, he served as the Founding Director of the Human-Computer Interaction Design Program, Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Research, the Executive Associate Dean of the School, and the first Chair of the Informatics Department.

From 1991 to 1999, Siegel was the Director of Research and Development at the Center for Excellence in Education. In this context, he founded Indiana University’s first start-up company, WisdomTools. The company focused on the development of “next generation” learning tools designed to develop deep, insightful learning. Siegel is among a group of pioneers in online learning, beginning with his work in the 1970s and 1980s on the PLATO system. At the University of Illinois, he was a professor in the Departments of Information Science and Educational Psychology. Additionally, he was the Assistant Director of the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory (CERL) and Head of CERL’s Curriculum and Applications Group. In 1988, he was Microsoft’s first Faculty Fellow.

Before coming to Indiana University in 1991, Siegel served as Director of Professional Services at Authorware (which became Macromedia and is now a part of Adobe). Siegel’s research at Indiana University focuses on the design of digital learning environments, slow change interaction design, and design pedagogy. He co-directed with Erik Stolterman a National Science Foundation grant on design methods.

Siegel earned BS and MS degrees in Educational Psychology from the University of Illinois at

Urbana-Champaign and holds a PhD in Educational Psychology, also from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Siegel is writing a book about teaching and learning design, The Design Habit: From Non-designer to Designer. He is also working on the development of a new company, Glerb, based on a concept he’s been working on for a few years. Its tagline is “Everyone has something to learn; everyone has something to teach.”