I’ve been at OpenEd in Richmond this week, and I feel bad about this post, because it’s been an amazing conference. For example, I’ve just come from post conference drinks with Audrey Watters, Ken Bauer, Christina Hendricks, Autumm Caines, Laura Gogia, Jim Luke, and so on. Anything that brings those people together in one place is worth applauding. So what follows is meant in the best possible friendly critique manner.
OpenEd conference needs to do better at, well, being open. Before we start, I’ll say I dislike the way people use ‘open’ as a means to bash others eg “if you’re open why do you charge conference fees at all?”. I understand the realities of running a conference. But I think OpenEd could do better here. My example involves myself and a moment of shame I felt, but I think it’s symptomatic, so this isn’t just catharsis. I was asked relatively late to be on a panel, talking about the Future OER essays people were asked to contribute. I like to be accommodating so I agreed. But I didn’t pay it much attention (in an effort to redeem myself here, I was presenting, taking part in 3 Virtually Connecting sessions and had arranged numerous meetings with people). Then, when it came to walk on stage I was one of 7 men to just one woman on the panel. I mean, really? In open ed, you could throw a cookie in the air and it’d land on any one of a number of women doing amazing things. It almost seems like it’d be harder to have a 7:1 ration than not.
I called this out when asked to introduce myself, but I know I lack a good degree of moral courage. I should have a) paid more attention when asked to be on the panel and b) walked off the stage when I saw it’s make up. This shit isn’t hard, it just takes a millisecond additional thought.
But I think it goes beyond that panel – there didn’t feel like the appropriate mix of voices beyond north America at that conference. It felt different from OE Global, which feels, well, global. I understand it is predominantly the conference for open ed in North America – that’s what it is, so that community will dominate. But I think we could do better. In a Virtually Connecting session later, I commented that often we (Virtually Connecting) feel grateful for conferences letting us be part of it (and OpenEd did a really great job here, for which they should be applauded), but also they should feel grateful to Maha and team for bringing in some different voices to the conference also.
I won’t address all the issues why it’s good practice to get these different perspectives involved, as so many better informed people than me have written about it, but just to add that it’s not a luxury, it’s vital. Anyway, I’ve learnt never agree to be on a panel without asking a few questions first, and for my failure to do that, I apologise.