About William Rankin
Dr. William Rankin is Director of Learning on the education team at Apple Inc., with special responsibility for promoting and enhancing innovative teaching and learning. Prior to joining Apple, he worked as an academic in higher education for 24 years, concluding his time as a Professor of English and Honors College Fellow at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas. As ACU’s Director of Educational Innovation, he helped design the world’s first one-to-one that gave every student an iOS device as a platform for exploring the impact of next-wave mobile devices on learning. He has received numerous awards for teaching and has presented on the implications of educational technology and emerging pedagogies in more than 30 countries.
As project lead for ACU’s Connected initiative, Rankin was named Campus Technology magazine’s Innovator of the Year for mobile learning in 2008. In 2009, he was named an Apple Distinguished Educator and in 2010, he began a three-year tenure on the US Board of Directors for the Apple Distinguished Educators program. Interviews with Rankin have appeared in Wired, The Guardian, and The Chronicle for Higher Education and at online sites including InsideHigherEd, Ars Technica, and Open Culture. Rankin has spoken at TEDxDubai and has also contributed to stories featured on US National Public Radio, the BBC, the CBC and NBC Nightly News.
Rankin holds BAs in English and French from Harding University, an MA in Literature from the University of California, Riverside, and a PhD in English with an emphasis on Medieval Literature from the University of Minnesota.