OEGlobal 2026: Full Schedule

All sessions are available online except round tables, special activities, and workshops.

arrow_back View All Dates

10:30am EDT

Feminist Pedagogy as Liberatory Practice

Friday October 9, 2026 10:30am - 11:35am EDT

ID: 34013

Equity and inclusion have recently become contentious topics on college campuses, but in the classroom, the expectation for student-centered learning remains constant. As educators navigate the tension between increased scrutiny of their teaching practices and eroding higher education institutions, pedagogy is at an inflection point. Institutional incentives to perpetuate the status quo abound; now more than ever, the educational is political.This panel calls for an analysis of power in and outside the classroom, and a confrontation of the patriarchal and oppressive underpinnings of traditional pedagogy. Despite a renewed focus on inclusion in the classroom, many teaching practices still center the professor-as-expert; promote a canon of white, Western-centric ways of knowing; and perpetuate a violent culture of individualism. Mainstream discourse around student-centered learning tends to reinforce hegemonic power structures and place the burden of change on educators rather than on institutions. To foster learning environments that are marked by belonging, agency, and connection, and to prepare students for an increasingly complex society, inclusive teaching practices must be accompanied by an analysis of power, both in the classroom and in the world around them.Feminist pedagogy is a framework that places questions of power, inequality, and justice at the center of teaching. Feminist scholar and educator bell hooks, informed by Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, defined feminist pedagogy as a liberatory practice that fosters critical thinking and provides students with the tools to question inequality and social structures. hooks framed the pursuit of learning as intertwined with the pursuit of liberation, and elevates educators as as catalysts for transformation who should foster love and justice. There is no precise formula for practicing feminist pedagogy; it comprises a set of unifying themes such as reducing the classroom power gap, viewing students as active participants in their education, addressing systems of oppression, and challenging those systems through a democratized classroom.This panel aims to highlight ways in which feminist pedagogical practices are currently shaping education, and explore ethical and practical challenges that educators face in their teaching. Emerging from the collaborative book project Feminist Designer: On the Personal and the Political in Design (MIT Press, 2023), which illuminates design as a feminist practice, we propose a moderated dialogue featuring five educators working at the intersections of art, design, and technology, each from diverse backgrounds and institutions in and outside the U.S. Each panelist arrives at this conversation through the unique lens of their own identities and experiences as educators, administrators, practicing designers, mothers, social workers, queer folx, and people of color. Topics to be addressed include power relations in the classroom; care as a pedagogical method; culturally responsive mentorship; curricula and projects that center social justice; where feminist and decolonial perspectives merge; and enacting change within institutions. Panelists will share a plurality of approaches to implementing feminist ways of knowing and doing in the classroom that could be applicable to any discipline. With an emphasis on collaboration and community, we aim to generate an open dialogue about education as a liberatory practice for both students and educators.

Speakers

Heather Snyder Quinn

Associate Professor, DePaul University

Heather Snyder Quinn, MFA is an Associate Professor of Design and Civics Institute Teacher-Scholar. She was named a 2024 “Researcher to Know” by the Illinois Science and Technology Coalition and serves on the board of directors for DePaul’s Institute for Business and Professional... Read More →

Ayako Takase

Associate Professor, Rhode Island School of Design

Ayako Takase is a designer and educator who centers their practice on creating experiences and objects that foster meaningful, emotive connections with people, culture, and audiences. Her life is a mixture of east and west—her early upbringing in Japan fostered an appreciation of... Read More →

Jeff Kasper

Associate Professor, UMass Amherst

Jeff Kasper is an interdisciplinary artist, writer, and educator, specializing in public art, design, community education, and social engagement. He creates text-based projects, experimental publications, games, audio storytelling, open editions, exhibitions, and workshops, often... Read More →

Alison Place

Assistant Professor Educator, University of Cincinnati

Alison Place is a designer, educator, and writer whose work explores the intersection of design and feminist theory as a space for critical making and radical speculation. She is the author of Feminist Designer: On the Personal and the Political in Design (MIT Press 2023), which illuminates... Read More →

Sarah Rutherford

Associate Professor, Cleveland State University

Sarah Rutherford is an Associate Professor of Design and the Undergraduate Director of Design at Cleveland State University and a former President of AIGA Cleveland. She researches, writes, and speaks about pedagogy and learning in higher education. She holds a Master of Fine Arts... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 10:30am - 11:35am EDT
3 Room I MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Panel

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

11:50am EDT

Filmbuilding: A Framework for Connection, Creativity, and Collective Learning

Friday October 9, 2026 11:50am - 12:20pm EDT

5 DR3

ID: 33723

At a time when access to knowledge and the ability to meaningfully engage with it is increasingly fragmented, educators are being called not just to share information, but to cultivate connection, creativity, and collective agency. This session introduces Filmbuilding as an open, adaptable framework that transforms learners from passive recipients of knowledge into active co-creators of meaning, relationships, and real-world solutions.Filmbuilding is a collaborative, project-based approach in which participants co-create short films through an emergent, iterative process that prioritizes curiosity, lived experience, and shared authorship. Unlike traditional media education models that emphasize technical skill acquisition or predefined outcomes, Filmbuilding operates as an open educational practice that is inherently flexible, culturally responsive, and transferable across contexts.Drawing from implementations in various settings — including city-wide initiatives like Filmbuilding Malden, school-based programs at Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School, and partnerships with organizations such as METCO and international sister city programs — this presentation demonstrates how Filmbuilding functions as a connective infrastructure. It creates spaces where diverse participants collaboratively explore identity, community, and complex social challenges through visual storytelling.Aligned with the OE Global 2026 theme of “inventing together to uphold knowledge as a public good,” this session highlights how Filmbuilding expands access not just to content, but to the processes of knowledge creation itself. Participants engage in real-time collaboration, navigating ambiguity, negotiating perspectives, and building shared understanding; skills essential for both open education practitioners and global citizens.The session will illustrate how Filmbuilding fosters:Human connection through structured yet open-ended collaboration across cultural and institutional boundariesCreativity and curiosity by centering exploration over correctness and process over productCollective resilience by enabling participants to engage with real-world issues in ways that are experiential, relational, and solution-orientedShared ownership of knowledge by positioning participants as co-creators who shape, interpret, and contribute meaningfully to the learning processImportantly, Filmbuilding is not presented as a fixed program, but as a scalable and adaptable framework that can be integrated into diverse educational ecosystems, including K-12 classrooms, higher education, community organizations, and cross-cultural exchanges. Its alignment with open education principles lies in its emphasis on co-creation, accessibility, and the democratization of storytelling as a tool for knowledge production.Attendees will leave with a clear understanding of how Filmbuilding can be applied within their own contexts to foster deeper engagement, strengthen community ties, and empower learners to collaboratively address complex challenges. The session will conclude with a Q&A inviting participants to explore potential adaptations, partnerships, and future applications within the global open education movement.

Speakers

Tom Flint

Founder & Director of Filmbuilding, Filmbuilding

Tom Flint is a moving image educator and filmmaker whose work sits at the intersection of film and cultural exchange. He is the founder and director of Filmbuilding, an educational initiative in which communities co-create films to explore and engage with real-world challenges. At... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 11:50am - 12:20pm EDT
5 DR3 MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

1:40pm EDT

Compensating the Creator: Four Grant Models of Tiered OER Support

Friday October 9, 2026 1:40pm - 2:10pm EDT

4 Room T

ID: 33369 While OER provides immediate cost savings for students, the creation of those materials still requires labor. To more fairly compensate the authors of OER textbooks, ancillary materials, and open pedagogy assignments, many institutions have created grant initiatives to subsidize faculty work encouraging the creation of OER (Finlay, 2024). This presentation will examine four programs at U.S. institutions that take a tiered approach to faculty incentives. This will allow others to learn from existing initiatives and potentially design or update their own.
After reviewing the programs, we will analyze program design, student outcomes, and propose best practices for tiered OER grant programs. Programs analyzed include Boise State University; Texas Tech University; Open Oregon Educational Resources, a state-level organization; and the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI), a library consortium. Each of these grant initiatives offers instruction to faculty on OER and open pedagogy, as well as having at least three tiers of available funding for adopting, revising, remixing, and creating materials. While they differ in the specific types of activities at each tier, all four programs include options for adopting OER as is, creating your own, and adapting a course to be no- or low-cost to students. To support this, all of the programs require some form of professional learning opportunity for participants, though they vary in terms of the types and degree required. This is a necessary element for faculty who may be unaware of the complex nuances of copyright, licensing, and sharing OER (Elder & Gallant, 2022). By reviewing two university programs and two organizations that serve multiple universities, we create a roadmap of scaffolded OER incentive programs relevant to the whole of the OER community.
By examining the existing landscape of these programs, including what types of activities they fund, how they prioritize adoption versus creation, how long they have been in place, and what metrics they report on, we will be able to identify trends and best practices that will inform an ideal OER faculty incentive program. One key element we will examine in each program is the extent to which the institution encourages collaboration among participants. Is there an opportunity to collaborate with other practitioners and support one another in the OER adoption and creation process, potentially beyond the duration of the grants?
Each OER initiative faces successes and challenges, but educators are more successful in OER practices when exposed to community groups and support from the OER community (Boyle, 2023). Having the opportunity to collaborate allows for human connection, fostering creativity and curiosity. Just as we can use the cost-saving nature of OER to open conversations around student engagement, agency, and voice in the classroom through open pedagogy, by funding faculty work around OER in an environment that fosters collaboration outside of traditional academic silos, we can spark new connections and ideas.

Speakers

Amy Hofer

Statewide Open Education Program Director, Open Oregon Educational Resources

Amy Hofer, Statewide Open Education Program Director, is the OER librarian for Oregon's colleges and universities; visit the Open Oregon Educational Resources website at openoregon.org to learn more.

Sabrina Davis

Assistant Librarian, Texas Tech University

Sabrina Davis is the Access & User Services Librarian at Texas Tech University. As the Access & User Services Librarian, she oversees the Access Services Department and ensures patrons have safe, reliable access to library resources and spaces. The Online Learning and Open Educational... Read More →

Hans Aagard

Research and Innovation Consultant - OER Focus, eCampus Center, Boise State University

Hans Aagard, PhD, is an OER specialist for Boise State University, supporting online faculty in the eCampus Center as they find, remix, or create open educational materials. Before working on OER he did instructional design and multimedia development. He lives in Salt Lake City... Read More →

Emily Helton

Affordable Learning Program Manager, Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI)

With a background in K-12 education and STEM professional development, Emily became interested in OER for the opportunities it affords to invite students into the knowledge creation process. After completing a PhD at West Virginia University examining how professional learning can... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 1:40pm - 2:10pm EDT
4 Room T MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

2:15pm EDT

Intentional Design for Open Authorship: Building Infrastructure, Community, and Time to Write

Friday October 9, 2026 2:15pm - 2:45pm EDT

2 Room M

ID: 33833

In this session, we invite Open Education program managers to rethink how to support OER creation and authors to re-envision their creation process. Open educational practices (OEP) are more than “putting an OER online” or putting an open license on your original in-copyright work. Ideally, OEP should permeate an entire project through thoughtful design of methods for selecting, supporting, and empowering learners — including authors. To ease the authorship process and center these OEP, VIVA developed the VIVA Rapid Publishing Program. This program identifies a gap in available OER in an area of high need for Virginia higher education, then assembles a team of subject-matter experts from around the state, provides infrastructure and synchronous in-person and online support for writing, and oversees the peer-review and publishing processes. The program includes preparatory meetings which precede a week-long in-person writing sprint, followed by peer review and iterative meetings to discuss potential revisions.In this presentation, we showcase open practices used in the program, such as intentional inclusive selection of project participants, support for authors-as-learners, and consensus-building on what to create and how. Our work addresses issues common to collaborative authoring of an open textbook in an attempt to reduce the sense of “overwhelm” when writing a lengthy work. Authors are guided along a highly structured yet responsive development process. This support streamlines processes of building an author team and scheduling time with your team; identifying and writing to your audience; setting tone, style, and tense; and deciding what content, pedagogical devices, and figures to include. The writing process is also collaborative–asking authors to create together and review each other’s work, rather than working in silos. By providing this time, space, and structure, we hope to provide an environment in which authors 1) form connections with other authors whom they previously may not have known, 2) can focus solely on writing–a rare occurrence in today’s busy society, 3) and experience freedoms and feedback needed to unlock both creativity, critical thinking, and productivity. In realizing these three goals, the program catalyzes what we believe are necessary conditions for the development of an OER with broad applicability and impact. This presentation provides an overview of the program, including the motivations behind the development and how we developed the structure. It will then showcase the inaugural cycle of the program, in which a team of ten developed a Leadership Studies textbook during 2025 and 2026. Members of the team will share their experiences and how this process benefited (or didn’t) their writing process. While we focus on our experience, we hope to provide a framework for anyone interested in running their own writing sprint, and we will share a toolkit for those wishing to replicate the program in their own contexts.

Speakers

Anita Walz

Associate Professor, Assistant Director of Open Education and Scholarly Communication Librarian, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Anita Walz is Associate Professor, Assistant Director of Open Education, and Scholarly Communication Librarian in the University Libraries at Virginia Tech. She received her MS in library and information science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has worked in... Read More →

Jessica Kirschner

Digital Publishing Coordinator, VIVA (Virginia’s Academic Library Consortium)

Jessica Kirschner is the Digital Publishing Coordinator at VIVA, Virginia’s academic library consortium. In this role, supports the publication efforts of VIVA's Open and Affordable Course Content program. Jessica began her career working in the acquisitions department at SUNY Press... Read More →

Joshua Marsh

Research and Instructional Librarian, Liberty University

Dr. Joshua Marsh is currently an Associate Professor at Liberty University, where he also serves as an Applied Research Chair in the School of Education. Dr. Marsh holds a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership from the University of Kentucky, a Master’s Degree in Education from Western... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 2:15pm - 2:45pm EDT
2 Room M MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality Hybrid
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

2:15pm EDT

Open for All: Implementing UNESCO’s Capacity Building Practices to Support a Thriving, Resilient OER Community

Friday October 9, 2026 2:15pm - 2:45pm EDT

6 DR4

ID: 34009

We support open education as a public good for all stakeholders within our postsecondary institutions. In this session, faculty and staff from the Alamo Colleges District in San Antonio, Texas, will describe how five independently accredited, minority-serving community colleges have collaborated to implement UNESCO’s (2022) key action item on OER capacity building to support open education for all!This session will present collaboratively developed open educational resources from five colleges, aimed at supporting educators new to or uncertain about using OER. The presenters will showcase the steps they have taken to develop faculty resilience and encourage curiosity in OER projects by overcoming barriers, such as limited time and working within silos (Luo, et al., 2019). The session will explore recommendations to assist faculty with selecting appropriate materials to support course outcomes, understanding license complexities, and exploring time-saving options for remixing. Attendees will learn about the Alamo Colleges OER Badge Course, developed at San Antonio College, which supports students, faculty, and staff in exploring the best practices in open licensing and OER. The presenters will describe how the badge course promotes community building by inviting Alamo Colleges stakeholders to develop foundational skills in OER while encouraging learners to consider the contributions they can make to the OER movement. Attendees will learn how to plan, develop, and implement an OER badge course. The session will also explore Palo Alto College’s Career and Experiential Learning Center OER Project. The presenters will describe how the project has invited students to become active contributors in the development of an open textbook through student-created examples, practice questions, study guides, and multimedia that reflect authentic student voices and perspectives. Attendees will learn how to create student-generated OER projects, supporting research that has found enhanced motivation, deepened learning, and development of transferable skills when students are positioned as creators contributing to the public good (Fatayer & Tualaulelei, 2023; Trust, Maloy, & Edwards, 2022). Attendees will learn how to develop their own student-informed processes to improve the quality and accessibility of OER while also giving students valuable experience in instructional design, peer review, and reflective learning. The presenters will share how these three projects have been guided by UNESCO’s six recommendations focused on capacity building:Building awareness among relevant stakeholder communities;Providing systematic and continuous capacity building (in-service and pre-service) on how to create, access, make available, re-use, adapt, and redistribute OER; Raising awareness of exceptions and limitations for the use of copyrighted works for educational and research purposes; Leveraging open licensed tools, platforms with interoperation of metadata, and standards to ensure OER can be found;Making available easily accessible resources that provide information and assistance to all OER stakeholders on OER-related topics, andPromoting digital literacy skills to encourage the development and use of OER (UNESCO, 2022, p. 11). Attendees will explore how they can take the lessons and recommendations gained through these three projects back to their institutions to build opportunities for their communities to explore OER for all!

Speakers

Suzel Molina

Professor, Palo Alto College

Professor Suzel Molina has taught Education, Kinesiology, Student Development, and Psychology courses at Palo Alto College for over 37 years. Recipient of the 2020 Canvas Educator of the Year, Professor Molina endeavors to inspire students to trust themselves while giving them the... Read More →

Beatrice Canales

Academic Unit Assistant/Grant Open Licensing Expert, San Antonio College

Ms. Beatrice Canales currently serves as the Open Licensing Expert and former grant project director of the Alamo Colleges OER Consortium Project, funded by a $1.96 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education’s Open Textbook Pilot Program. She has served as an academic staff... Read More →

Anne Best

English Instructor, St. Philip’s College

Anne Best is an English instructor of 20 years at St. Philip’s College in San Antonio, Texas, with a commitment to multicultural and global perspectives in education. She holds a master’s degree in English from Texas A&M University, San Antonio. Best advocates for open educational... Read More →

Rosalie Wallace

Academic Program Coordinator/Adjunct Faculty Member, St. Philip’s College

Rosalie Wallace has taught General Biology courses and Environmental Biology courses for St. Philip’s College for six years. She has a Bachelor’s in Science from the University of the Incarnate Word and a Master of Arts from the University of Texas at San Antonio. In her roles... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 2:15pm - 2:45pm EDT
6 DR4 MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

3:00pm EDT

The Future of Openness Is Shared: Co-Creating Communication Strategies

Friday October 9, 2026 3:00pm - 3:30pm EDT

5 DR3

ID: 34026

This session explores an open education collaborative’s approach to developing a shared communication strategy for open education grounded in collective invention, practical tools, and adaptable frameworks. As open education initiatives expand across institutions and systems, the challenge is not only demonstrating impact, but communicating that impact in ways that resonate across diverse contexts, roles, and disciplines. This session positions communication as a core infrastructure for the future of openness that must be intentionally designed.This open education collaborative has engaged in an iterative process to co-create communication strategies that support open education advocacy, publishing, and program development. Rather than developing top-down messaging, participants have worked together to build communication practices. As a group they have tested language and built shared resources that can be contextualized for individual projects while also contributing to a broader, collective voice.This session highlights the process of inventing communication strategies together. Presenters will share how members of the collaborative identified common communication challenges such as translating open education work into disciplinary language, aligning with subject-matter conversations, and articulating impact beyond cost savings, and responded by co-developing practical tools. These include reusable templates for project workflows, social media campaigns, project descriptions, and stakeholder engagement, all designed to be adapted for each project. A central focus of the session is how these communication strategies function as living artifacts of collaborative practice. Presenters will demonstrate how quarterly communications, social media interactions and project templates were developed through cycles of contribution, feedback, and revision. Each communication strategy serves as an entry point for participation, creating space for new contributors to engage in open education communication work without starting from scratch. Examples will include communication plans with structured cadences, messaging frameworks aligned with student success language, and modular content that can be tailored to different audiences and platforms.Aligned with the conference theme, Catalyzing Human Connection, Creativity, and Curiosity to Thrive, this session emphasizes the future of openness as a participatory, co-constructed endeavor. It highlights how shared communication infrastructures built through open collaboration can support both consistency and flexibility, enabling open education work to be visible, credible, and connected across contexts.Attendees will leave with adaptable templates, strategies for collaborative message development, and a deeper understanding of how communication itself can be an open practice. The session will conclude with a facilitated discussion inviting participants to consider how they might engage in or initiate similar processes within their own networks, contributing to a more connected and communicative open education ecosystem.

Speakers

Kathy Essmiller

Coordinator, OpenOKState, Oklahoma State University

Kathy is an open education leader, librarian, and educator dedicated to advancing access to education and community through the adoption and creation of open educational resources (OER). As the Coordinator of OpenOKState at Oklahoma State University, Kathy collaborates with faculty... Read More →

Jojo Karlin

Scholarly Communications Manager, CUNY Office of Library Services

Dr. Jojo Karlin is the Scholarly Communications Manager at the CUNY Central Office of Library Services. As the manager of CUNY Academic Works, the system’s open access institutional repository, Jojo facilitates the development and legacy of student, faculty, and staff research... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 3:00pm - 3:30pm EDT
5 DR3 MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

3:35pm EDT

Open as Resilience: Collaborations, Storytelling, and Solidarity in Contexts of Crisis

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT

7 DR5

ID: 33503

In challenging political climates, Open Education is more than a public good - it is an act of resilience and in some cases, resistance. By amplifying voices from disrupted and conflict-affected contexts, open practitioners can foster connection, reciprocal learning, and meaningful global support.This session explores the Open as Resilience webinar series, co-created by the Community College Consortium for OER (CCCOER), the North American node of Open Education Global, and SPARC Europe’s European Network of Open Education Librarians (ENOEL), which centers educators working within conditions of conflict and instability. Through collaborations with colleagues in Ukraine,Palestine, and beyond, this work has made local experiences more visible while building pathways for sustained, cross-organizational support.Emerging from partnerships within ENOEL, and evolving in response to the ongoing war in Ukraine, this initiative demonstrates how distributed collaboration can adapt to changing needs. Open practitioners have leveraged existing resources, formed new partnerships, and responded to locally identified priorities through small but impactful actions.Bringing together voices from ENOEL, CCCOER, as well as a new voice, who will bring the perspective from a different generation researching Open practices in emergencies, this session highlights the role of storytelling as a tool for resilience, advocacy, and connection. Building on this work, we will also share insights from our Stories as Resistance workshops, which invite participants to engage in storytelling as a reflective and collective practice. We will explore how storytelling has shaped collaborations, including MIT Open Learning’s work with Ukrainian librarians to translate open textbooks from MIT OpenCourseWare into local language.We invite attendees to commit to discussion and engagement on topics around the opportunities and challenges of storytelling in open practice, including, but not limited to, the nuances of addressing sensitive topics and approaches that respect contextual needs, risks, and cultures.

Speakers

Paola Corti

Senior Open Education Expert, SPARC Europe

Paola Corti is a Senior Open Education Expert at SPARC Europe, and she manages the European Network of Open Education Librarians (ENOEL); she supports librarians in taking action to implement the UNESCO OER Recommendation. She also works part of her time at Politecnico di Milano (Italy... Read More →

Heather Blicher

Director, Community College Consortium for OER (CCCOER), Open Education Global

Heather Blicher is the Director of the Community College Consortium for OER (CCCOER) with Open Education Global, where she leads efforts to expand and support Open Education across community and technical colleges in North America. A passionate advocate for access, equity, and collaboration... Read More →

Adriana D’Amico

Education Policy Student - Intern Researcher @ Monash Virtual School, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Adriana D’Amico is a postgraduate student currently enrolled in an Erasmus Mundus Master program on education policies from global development. During her bachelor in Economics and social sciences she took part in both advocacy activities, working with a team to promote pluralism... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT
7 DR5 MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Panel

Speaker Modality Hybrid
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

3:35pm EDT

Coding a Drawing Tool Together: Learning How to Contribute to Open Source Software

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT

4 Room T

ID: 33970

The Processing Foundation’s mission is to promote software learning within the arts, artistic learning within technology-related fields, and to celebrate the diverse communities that make these fields vibrant, liberatory, and innovative. We work toward our goals by developing and distributing open source software (OSS) projects, Processing (Java) and p5.js (JavaScript). OSS has become one of the major cultural and technical achievements of the past half-century. Unlike commercial software, this work is a shared commons, built through collective knowledge, community practice, and sustained human effort. Unfortunately, there is often a significant gap between learning about OSS and developing the confidence to meaningfully contribute to it. Within communities that support Processing and p5.js, this gap is increasingly visible as we confront what Cabunoc Mayes and others have described as the “graying of open source,” a trend in which long-standing contributors are not being replaced by a new, diverse generation of participants (2025). As we celebrate 25 years of Processing, this moment calls for new approaches to access, participation, and recruitment through education. We developed a curriculum called Art + Code, which pairs with a professional development (PD) learning experience for K-12 educators with little or no prior coding background. The goals are to democratize access to computer science education and to reframe OSS contribution as a creative and collaborative practice. Throughout the PD, educators learn pedagogical practices for teaching creative coding while engaging as learners of the Art + Code curriculum. They explore foundational programming concepts through visually driven projects in p5.js. The culminating experience shifts from individual creation to collective contributions in the final project: the drawing tool. Here, participants develop custom “brushes” for a shared drawing tool, contributing code to a communal software project. Using OpenProcessing’s Live Collaboration feature, participants work together in a shared coding environment. This experience mirrors authentic OSS workflows while making visible the social dimensions of software development like attribution, remixing, negotiation, and collective ownership. For many educators, this is their first experience contributing to a shared codebase, reframing their understanding of what it means to “belong” in technical spaces.This session will share findings from pilot implementations of Art + Code across diverse educator cohorts. We will present qualitative insights and classroom observations that highlight how learners engage with core coding concepts through creative expression, as well as how participation in collaborative coding environments shifts their confidence and identity as potential contributors to OSS. We will also share educator feedback, including evidence of increased willingness to experiment, debug, and build on others’ work. This session is designed for educators, curriculum designers, and open education advocates by offering both a conceptual framework and practical strategies for bridging the gap between learning and contributing to OSS. Participants will leave with concrete approaches to integrating collaborative, open-source practices into their own teaching, as well as access to the freely available Art + Code curriculum. In an effort to invite a broader and more diverse community into open source, this project centers creativity, collaboration, and meaning-making.

Speakers

Roxana Hadad

Co-Executive Director, Processing Foundation

For the last 25 years, Roxana Hadad, PhD has led research and programming aimed at making STEM and computer science education experiences equitable and relevant to students from historically excluded communities. As a Co-Executive Director at Processing Foundation, she oversees initiatives... Read More →

Amy B. Woodman

Director, Fellowship Program, Processing Foundation

Amy B. Woodman is the Director of Fellowship Programs at Processing Foundation, where she supports artists and creative technologists developing open-source tools. She brings over a decade of experience designing programs across education, technology, and the arts, with a focus on... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT
4 Room T MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality Online
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

3:35pm EDT

Strategic Alignment: Leveraging OER to Foster Transformative Faculty Partnerships

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT

2 Room M

ID: 33984

ProblemFor academic libraries, building meaningful, sustained connections with teaching faculty is essential, yet this work is often constrained by transactional liaison engagement practices. To disrupt this pattern, Eastern Kentucky University librarians develop structured Library Program Plans that align information literacy instruction, collections, and outreach with student learning outcomes across program curricula. Moving beyond ad hoc instruction requests or one-off interactions such as collection requests, Program Plans create a shared framework that encourages ongoing dialogue between librarians and teaching faculty. Further, when Open Educational Resources (OER) are woven into program plans, faculty can more clearly see how OER support their academic freedom, pedagogical growth, and course-level student learning goals. In this context, Open Educational Resources (OER) - often framed simply as cost-saving initiatives - invite creative, program-level collaboration and offer a clear framework in which to develop meaningful, sustained faculty engagement, grounded in mutual goals for student success.InterventionThis session explores the ways that Program Plans can be developed to intentionally include Open Educational Resources (OER) and affordable course material strategies as a core component of faculty engagement. By embedding OER considerations directly into curriculum mapping — such as identifying high-enrollment courses, gateway sequences, and points of high student cost burden — librarians can facilitate more meaningful, context-aware conversations with faculty. By identifying specific learning outcomes first, and offering faculty quality, open alternatives to their existing course materials, OER emerge as solutions to instructional design challenges, positioning faculty as active instructional architects rather than consumers of static commercial content.ExamplesDrawing on practitioner experience, the session will highlight examples of OER-integrated Program Plan templates that include fields for documenting course material types, cost considerations, and opportunities for OER adoption, adaptation, or creation. These tools make visible where alignment already exists and where new opportunities for collaboration can be developed. Attendees will see how structured, curriculum-aligned approaches can support faculty decision-making while maintaining respect for disciplinary context and instructional autonomy.OutcomesParticipants will leave with practical strategies for using curriculum alignment to build resilient, relationship-centered partnerships with teaching faculty; integrating OER into program-level planning tools; and framing conversations around student outcomes, access, and instructional goals. By situating OER within a broader ecosystem of connection, creativity, and shared inquiry, this approach offers a replicable model for fostering collective thriving through sustained, program-level engagement.SignificanceBy centering OER in program planning, librarians can move beyond a narrow affordability narrative toward one focused on quality, agency, and student success. This shift strengthens faculty partnerships by aligning with core motivations — supporting student learning, preserving academic autonomy, and enabling the adaptation of course materials to meet the needs of students.

Speakers

Kelly Smith

Director of Strategic Initiatives, Eastern Kentucky University

Kelly Smith is the Director of Strategic Initiatives at Eastern Kentucky University Libraries where she directs library assessment, reporting activities, and policy development, and co-leads the Libraries’ open education program with Bailey Lake. She is currently working on an EdD... Read More →

Bailey Lake

Open Strategies Librarian, Eastern Kentucky University

Bailey Lake is the Open Strategies Librarian at Eastern Kentucky University Libraries, where she advocates for open education and facilitates OER creation in partnership with university OER champions. Bailey is especially passionate about open pedagogy projects and the impact of renewable... Read More →

Friday October 9, 2026 3:35pm - 4:05pm EDT
2 Room M MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge MA 02139 USA

Presentation

Speaker Modality In-person
Track Catalyzing Human Connection Creativity and Curiosity to Thrive

4:15pm EDT

Don’t I Know You?: Re-Designing Open Programming for Inventive Collaboration

Friday October 9, 2026 4:15pm - 4:30pm EDT

Video

ID: 33460

Open Education programming often favors the familiar, but curiosity and connection can take us somewhere meaningful and new. This talk explores what happens when we treat programming not as event planning, but as relationship-building. Grounded in this approach, it highlights how curiosity, informal conversations, and community feedback can lead to more inclusive, responsive, and collaborative programming that upholds knowledge as a public good.I’ll briefly share two experimental formats shaped by this philosophy: 1) From the Field, and 2) Open Exchange – both designed to create space for dialogue, not just delivery. In Open Exchange, for example, sessions aren’t recorded by design, encouraging participants to speak freely, reflect openly, and engage in richer, more candid conversations, reinforcing collective knowledge-building.Working in “inventive spaces” means making room for new perspectives, unexpected connections, and the kinds of conversations that don’t always fit neatly into a traditional webinar, but matter just the same. In a field that values openness, this is an invitation to consider not just what we share, but who we make space for, how we design it, and who we might become as a result of the shared reinvention of knowledge.

Speakers