2026 Open Education Conference

Open education often emphasizes digital access and sharing, but I’ve been thinking more about the relationships that actually make openness possible. In this session, I reflect on a community Pow Wow hosted at Cambrian College as an example of “another kind of open.”

As someone working in reconciliation education, I’ve come to see the Pow Wow as more than an event. It’s a space where learning happens through connection, respect, and reciprocity, a space where social justice and intercultural exchange are lived and felt. I see Indigenous pride and allyship in action. Helpers each play a unique role in creating an inclusive space rooted in Anishinaabe culture.

The Pow Wow encourages me to question the idea that openness is primarily digital, and to think about how the ethos of open education lives in relationships and community practices. I’ll invite attendees to reflect on how these observations might influence their own work and understanding of openness beyond the screen.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Describe how a community Pow Wow can function as a site of relational learning and “another kind of open”.
• Reflect on how relationships, roles, and responsibilities shape meaningful open practices.
• Identify ways that openness can extend beyond digital spaces into community-based contexts.
• Consider how reconciliation education, allyship, and Indigenous-led spaces can inform their understanding of open education.
• Apply insights from this session to re-think their own approaches to openness in their teaching or work.

As generative AI disrupts traditional assumptions about student writing, many instructors have responded with increased control and surveillance. This session argues for an alternative solution grounded in open education and assessment literacy. Drawing on a redesign of an ENG101 course, the presentation explores a shift from teaching essay writing as a product to using essays as representations of critical thinking within a transparent assessment framework. The session highlights a critical gap in higher education: limited faculty preparation in designing valid and reliable instruments for measuring learning. By clarifying learning constructs, aligning assignments with evidence claims, and openly sharing rubrics and criteria, this approach improves transparency, equity, and instructional coherence. The session positions open assessment as a necessary evolution of open education and a pedagogically sound response to AI.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Explain why traditional essay-based assessments often produce invalid or unreliable inferences about student critical thinking, especially in AI-mediated learning environments.
• Identify the key components of an open assessment framework, including construct definition, evidence alignment, and transparent criteria.
• Describe how open education principles—such as transparency, shared practice, and learner agency—apply to the design of assessments, not just course materials.
• Recognize common misconceptions about measuring learning (e.g., equating product quality with cognitive processes) and how these misconceptions contribute to inequity.
• Articulate how openly shared rubrics, prompts, and assessment criteria can improve instructional coherence and support AI-resilient, equity-centered teaching practices.

For some, accessibility and the Title II requirements are a requirement that feels like an insurmountable feat. For others, accessibility is the window into stronger instructional design and along the way - connections to colleagues that inspire, connect and unite us. Open Education's tenants of inclusion, iteration and innovation have long driven advances in the Educational Technology world, but it's the opportunity to genuinely work together in small groups, finding new partners along that way that centers Open Ed colleagues as leaders in the accessibility movement. This panel will allow you to hear from and ask questions of people who are creating spaces for moving beyond compliance of Title II and into the space of creating genuinely accessible OER. This panel will spark your connections to other like-minded leaders who see Accessibility as a "how might we..." opportunity and lead to finding your own Accessibili-buddies.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Participants will receive an update on Accessibility Practices as related to OER.
• Participants will analyze example collaboration resources for building Accessibility Communities of Practice.
• Participants will reflect on their own questions about creating Accessible OER to consider next steps they might take.
• Participants will join a broader community of colleagues who are committed to Accessible OER.

What would it look like if every course you taught was more inclusive, more transparent, and more centered on the learners in front of you? At a time when educators are being asked to do more with less, and to do it more equitably, Critical Open Educational Practices (Critical OEPs) offer a framework for meaningful change. This session centers the practitioner experience of seven MinnState educators who arrived at Critical OEPs through different pathways, and whose engagement with the framework affirmed their values, expanded their practice, and moved their teaching in new directions. Grounded in four pillars, collaborative dialogue, critical reflection, inquiry-based learning, and transformative action, Critical OEPs offer a path toward pedagogical transformation. This session explores how educators negotiated authority, practiced equity, and sustained change within institutional constraints. Attendees will reflect on their practice and leave with concrete ideas for their classrooms.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Identify the four pillars of Critical OEPs and connect them to their own existing teaching practices.
• Describe how educators negotiated authority, equity, and learner agency within real institutional constraints.
• Articulate at least one concrete next step for deepening their engagement with Critical OEPs in their own classroom.