2026 Open Education Conference

Qualitative research allows us to dig deeper and examine experiences, motivations, and in-depth insights into human behavior and social contexts. In open education, qualitative research is often used to explore how students or faculty perceive the value of either the resources or practices aligned with open. Reflexivity is a practice in qualitative research that helps researchers situate their relational awareness in an effort to critically engage with how they may be influencing the research process and findings. Similarly, a researcher’s positionality is informed by their own identities and epistemological worldviews. Both of these entities innately shape and impact what’s written into the canon; therefore, committing to embedding reflexive practices into our research is essential to better understand researcher motivations and value systems in knowledge production. Come join us to learn more about these concepts and how you can start to include them into your own research.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Explain reflexivity and positionality.
• Articulate the importance of researcher reflexivity and positionality in open education research.
• Identify opportunities to apply these concepts to their own work.

The space between open education (OE) and knowledge mobilization (KMb) is rich with possibilities. It has been overlooked despite shared values and complementary practices. Both OE and KMb seek to extend the use of knowledge and cultivate meaningful engagement beyond traditional scholarly audiences, particularly through co-creation. As we continue to look for ways to integrate OE in institutional practices and policies, KMb offers a meaningful opportunity to think about “educational” as a broader function that includes the dissemination and application of research findings.

While OER advocates may already be aware of overlaps between OE and KMb, this presentation is an invitation to combine the vocabulary of both fields to frame OER creation in ways that resonate with researchers, administrators, and leaders, positioning open educational practices as directly connected to institutional priorities such as research impact, community engagement, and innovation.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Identify the shared values and practices of open education and knowledge mobilization.
• Explain how OER creation can be framed as a knowledge mobilization activity that aligns with institutional priorities.
• Reflect on strategies to position OER production as a recognized, valued scholarly activity within research-intensive universities.

When public institutions work together and pool resources to address common curriculum and educational technology needs, there are many benefits. These collaborative projects can leverage collective expertise, generate efficiencies, and distribute workload and costs. This session looks at the findings from a two-year initiative in British Columbia, Canada, that investigated models and mechanisms for enabling this kind of institutional collaboration. We will explore key things that foster and sustain collaborative ventures as well as the structural barriers, and make a case for investing in open approaches on a system level, including open communities, technologies, content, and infrastructure.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Describe the benefits of institutions working together on shared curriculum and technology projects.
• Define sustainment and describe considerations that play into sustaining collaborative projects, including open projects.
• Explain the benefits of open from a system point of view.
• Draw upon the lessons learned by existing collaborative initiatives.

OER funding decisions at the university level are often driven by a narrow ‘return on investment’: how many dollars saved, how many students reached. But meaningful open education work—especially projects with ripple effects beyond our campuses—generates value that is qualitative, communal, and long-term. This session explores the “space between” quantitative and qualitative ROI in OER grant project evaluation, sharing a tool and strategies for making multi-dimensional impact visible and actionable for grant makers and practitioners alike.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Generate and prioritize examples of non-monetary ROI geared to their respective institutions.
• Construct a customized copy of the shared rubric for non-monetary ROI.
• Incorporate elements of non-monetary ROI in their grantmaking work to illuminate the broader and deeper impact of funded OER projects.

For decades, OER have been highlighted as adaptable learning materials that can fit different contexts and needs. But this is not always reflected in the OER we present to faculty. The glossy, textbook-shaped OER that we like to showcase do not align with the variety of excellent teaching practices and materials that educators actually use. When we call out quality through similarities to textbooks, we conflict with the purpose of open education: to empower educators and improve access for students.

In this session, we explore collective conceptions of OER–what they are, what they can be, and how quality is defined. The “ideal” OER does not need to be a textbook with homework software. To support better teaching, what we need are infrastructures that support diverse needs. Participants who join this discussion will have the chance to voice their perspectives on how we can empower educators to implement a variety of teaching and learning materials and approaches, not just textbooks.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Articulate issues regarding how we as open practitioners and advocates miss opportunities to uplift small-scale OER;.
• Recognize opportunities to engage with and support community-driven and alternative open education projects;.
• Reflect on their current practices for developing and talking about “high quality OER; and.
• List three or more potential paths forward for individuals and the open education community around the topic of quality and opportunity for OER.

Open education often advances through disconnected efforts in policy, coordination, and practice. This session explores how connecting those “open dots” can strengthen impact across Europe. Drawing on SPARC Europe’s work on Connecting the Opens, the feasibility report for a European Open Education Alliance, and the community-building work of the European Network of Open Education Librarians (ENOEL), the presentation examines how open education can be better linked with related open movements, supported through stronger coordination, and sustained through practitioner networks. Rather than treating these as separate strands, it presents them as complementary parts of a broader strategy to advance open education as a public good. Attendees will gain a European perspective on how policy alignment, alliance-building, and community practice can work together to create more coherent, connected, and sustainable open education ecosystems.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Describe how policy, alliance-building, and community practice interact in shaping open education ecosystems.
• Explain the value of connecting open education with adjacent open movements.
• Identify key opportunities and challenges in building more coordinated open education structures at a regional level.
• Analyse the contribution of practitioner networks such as ENOEL to sustaining the open in practice.
• Apply the idea of “connecting the open dots” to their own institutional, national, or regional context.

Every day, we hit warp speed. Every day, we forget what it means to warp. If Open Education programs want to survive, our captains need to stare into The Warp, the Immaterium, the Unspace: The Space Between.

The early years of open education management included what many leaders called "building the plane as we flew it." Open Education organizations and initiatives were assembled for pilot projects like grant programs or workshops - sometimes built solely around the existence of funding or an idea for one event. As OE programs mature, what used to be "the plane" now travels faster than light. But do we know enough about how we travel? Do we understand what it means to warp?

Through the cosmic lenses of Star Trek, Warhammer 40K, and Adrian Tchaikovsky, Jeff will take you through the sometimes-painful creation of an open Standard Operating Procedures document and how this practice could help build transparency and ethical automation into the fundamental processes that make Open happen.

Attendees of this session will be able to:

• Identify standard definitions and explain their open education programs within these terms.
• Adapt and create a Standard Operating Procedures document for their own open education program.
• Build accessibility into existing processes and target accessibility-by-default in both publishing and work procedures.