Punya Mishra is Director of Innovative Learning Futures at the Learning Engineering Institute (LEI) and Professor in the Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching & Learning Innovation at Arizona State University (with an affiliate appointment in the Design School).

He is internationally recognized for his work in educational technology; the role of creativity and aesthetics in learning; and the application of collaborative, design-based approaches to educational innovation. He has received over $11 million in grants; published over 200 articles and edited 5 books. A recipient of AECT’s David H. Jonassen Excellence in Research Award, with over 67,000 citations of his research, he is ranked among the top 2% of scientists worldwide (#91 in social science) and ranked #62 (#11 in psychology) among educational scholars with the biggest influence on educational practice and policy.

Punya has extensive leadership experience in higher education, having previously served as Associate Dean of Scholarship & Innovation (at MLFTC), where he led a range of initiatives that provided a future-forward, equity driven, approach to inter/trans-disciplinary educational research. He has also served as director of doctoral programs (at MLFTC) and the award-winning Master of Arts in Educational Technology program (at Michigan State). He currently is a member of the steering committee of ASU’s Leadership Academy, AACTE’s Technology and Innovation Committee, and editor-in-residence for the Journal of Teacher Education.

An AERA Fellow (2024), TED-Ed educator (2023), he co-hosts the award-winning Silver Lining for Learning webinar as well as the Learning Futures podcast. He is an award-winning instructor, an engaging public speaker, and an accomplished visual artist and poet.

Must reads

Popular Topics: Gen AI <Posts & Pubs> | 5 Spaces for Design <Posts & Pubs>| TPACK | Design |Creativity | Ambigrams

Blog Posts

Who Ordered That? On AI, Education, and the Illusion of Necessity

Who Ordered That? On AI, Education, and the Illusion of Necessity

On April 22, 2025, The Washington Post reported on a draft executive order from the Trump administration that outlines a sweeping plan to embed artificial intelligence into K-12 education. The order calls for AI to be integrated into teaching practices, teacher...

Can AI Be a Therapist? A Friend? What Are We Even Doing?

Can AI Be a Therapist? A Friend? What Are We Even Doing?

I was recently invited to a webinar organized by the AZ AI Alliance, titled: Thorny Topics: AI and Student Mental Health Along with Dr. Kristen Mattson (University of Illinois), Mica Mulloy (Brophy College Prep) and host Luke Allpress, we jumped into some of the most...

Artificial Intimacy: How AI Exploits Our Social Brains

Artificial Intimacy: How AI Exploits Our Social Brains

A recent study published in the Harvard Business Review (How People Are Really Using Gen AI in 2025) provides compelling insights into the evolving landscape of generative AI use. The research involved analyzing posts from Reddit, Quora and other articles over the...

Human Creativity to the Power of AI: The Event

Human Creativity to the Power of AI: The Event

When Nicole Oster, Lindsey McCaleb and I were discussing the design of DCI691: Human Creativity × AI in Education before this semester started, we envisioned a space where we (students and faculty alike) could collectively explore the fascinating boundaries between...

Designing for Creative Learning: New book chapter

Designing for Creative Learning: New book chapter

I'm excited to share my recent work with colleagues Richard West, Jason McDonald, and Melissa Warr exploring how instructional designers can intentionally foster creativity through Gl?veanu's 5A Framework. It was published in the prestigious Oxford Handbook of...

ASU-Cintana Innovation Talk for Faculty: Education in an Age of GenAI

ASU-Cintana Innovation Talk for Faculty: Education in an Age of GenAI

I was recently invited to speak on the topic of "Education in an Age of Generative AI" at a special webinar series organized by the ASU-Cintana Alliance. In this talk, I explored both the potential and considerations surrounding Generative AI in education, emphasizing...

… or check out some random blog posts

Human Creativity & AI in Education: Week 1

Human Creativity & AI in Education: Week 1

This semester I am teaching a course titled Human Creativity x AI in Education. We have 19 students in the class, split into 5 groups. (And yes though I love prime numbers, having one more participant would have been better). Each week one of the groups will document...

On making computation visible

Here is a cool video about a "a mechanical, binary adding machine that uses marbles to flip the bits" - in other words a computer made of wood, that works at a pace that we can grasp! Marvelous. (HT: Collision Detection). Check out the video: [youtube width="425"...

Introducing Matt ‘n Punya

Joel Colbert is coordinating the AACTE special forum on TPCK and will be introducing all the speakers and leading the discussion after the presentations. He asked each of the speakers to send him a short introductory blurb that he could use to introduce us. This is...

Palindromic Poetry

A few years ago I got bitten by the bug of Palindromic Poetry - poems that double back on themselves, that can be read this way, or that. This is consistent with my love for ambigrams and other kinds of symmetrical wordplay. Take a look...

MSU Technology Showcase: The Usual Suspects

I have been invited by Patrick Dickson, Byron Brown and Jon Sticklen to offer a lowkeynote address (note emphasis on lowkey!) for MSU's Second Annual Faculty Technology Showcase (more details here). I have created a small presentation to go with my lowkeynote, slides...

Designing learning futures through reflective practice: 1 of 2

Designing learning futures through reflective practice: 1 of 2

This is the first of two posts on the topic of bringing principled innovation practices to designing learning futures. The first post (co-authored by Punya Mishra & Cristy Guleserian) focuses on the need for designing learning futures, and how the PI practices...

Happy 2012

Every Christmas-break our family creates a stop-motion video new year's greeting card. We have been doing this for 4 years or so and it is an incredibly fun way to spend time together. It has become a "signature" thing we do as a family. Anyway this year was no...

49 Amazing moments of STEM: New article

49 Amazing moments of STEM: New article

The universe is made up of stories not atoms — Muriel Rukyeser (Image © punyamishra) Every educator has had an amazing teaching moment. It is that magical moment, when the topic comes to life and the energy in the classroom is palpable. These are moments that we...

Of raindrops and dying flowers

Of raindrops and dying flowers

The rainfall in June –the poems I’ve pasted to wallspeel off, but leave traces.~ Basho All photos taken with my iPhone8©punyamishra