Registration is now open for the 11th Annual Open Education Conference (“OpenEd”) on November 19-21 in Washington, D.C. OpenEd is considered the premier international event for the Open Educational Resources (OER) community, and this year will draw hundreds of practitioners, advocates, researchers and policymakers to explore the theme of “achieving the potenital of open.”
SPARC is delighted to be a partner in this year’s OpenEd, and we have a few exciting announcements to share:
- Advocacy Day: SPARC is coordinating the first ever OpenEd Advocacy Day on Tuesday November 18. This free pre-conference event will give participants a unique opportunity to engage face-to-face with policymakers and advance OER awareness while on the ground in Washington, D.C. The day will begin with a training run by professional advocates to prepare participants for successful meetings, including effective talking points, answers to tough questions, and etiquette. Then, participants will spread out across Washington, D.C. for pre-scheduled meetings at key political institutions, including Congressional offices, Federal agencies, inter-governmental organizations, and foreign embassies. The event will also occur back-to-back with OpenCon 2014, a conference for students and early career researchers on Open Access, Open Education, and Open Data on November 15-17. Select OpenCon 2014 attendees will join the OpenEd Advocacy Day to lend their important voice as the next generation and share their newly-improved advocacy skills. Click here to sign up.
- Libraries & OER Track: Recognizing the growing interest and engagement of academic and research libraries, the conference program includes a day-long track on Libraries & OER. Scheduled for the first day of the conference, the track will include five panels that explore how libraries are advancing OER – including faculty support, publishing, and professional development. Speakers include representatives from some of the most exciting library-led OER projects, including those at UMASS Amherst, Oregon State University, and Tacoma Community College. SPARC worked closely with community members to develop the program, and we could not be more excited to engage in and support the discussions before, during and after the conference.
- Heather Joseph Keynote: Finally, we are honored that SPARC’s Executive Director Heather Joseph is a keynote speaker at OpenEd, along with Larry Lessig and John Wilbanks. Our involvement in OpenEd highlights our growing contributions to the Open Education space, and also the ongoing significance of our recent SPARC meeting theme of “convergence” between Open Access and openness in other areas.
Stay tuned for more updates, and we hope to see you in November!
Follow the conference on Twitter at #opened14
Links:
Registration: http://openedconference.org/2014/registration/
Program: http://openedconference.org/2014/program/
Advocacy Day Sign Up: http://sparc2.arl.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=138
OpenCon 2014: http://www.opencon2014.org