The story
The beginnings of ASCILITE can be traced to 1983 when the University of Queensland hosted a conference on Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (CALITE, 1983) that attracted approximately 200 delegates. By 1985 interest had grown and at CALITE (1985) John Bowden led the foundation of the Australian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (ASCILITE). Since then ASCILITE has hosted annual conferences each December, apart from a collaborative venture with the World Conference on Computers in Education in 1990 when it was host to a special Computer Based Training session and a second collaboration with the TAFE and Schools sectors at the 1994 APITITE (Asia Pacific Information Technology in Training and Education) conference.
During the late 1990s the Society's focus was broadening beyond Australia and in 1997 the Society's name was changed from ‘Australian’ to ‘Australasian’ to reflect the growing regional role that the Society was playing in the area of technology enhanced learning. The hosting of the 2002 conference in Auckland, New Zealand marked the twentieth conference and also the first time that ASCILITE was hosted outside Australia. In 2024 ASCILITE hosted its biggest conference ever in Melbourne, Australia, with over 500 participants.
From Wikipedia’s article on Australasian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3