We’re looking forward to the 2023 Open edX conference, happening from Tuesday, March 28th through Friday, March 31st. We’d love to share with you what we’re planning for each day of the conference, today highlighting the conference schedule on Wednesday and Thursday. On these two days, the conference will feature keynote speakers, talk sessions, lightning talks, and a cocktail reception. All talks on Wednesday and Thursday will be recorded. Read on for more!
Keynote Speakers
Each morning will feature a selection of keynote speakers drawn from areas of education and open source. The keynote speakers have not been announced yet, but expect to hear from dynamic and inspiring speakers delving into topics that reinforce our conference theme, Shaping the Future of Education Together.
Previous conferences have featured speakers such as Tobie Langel, Paula Marques, Walter Bender, Candace Thille, Anant Agarwal, and more! Additionally, the conference typically features a State of Open edX presentation, which discusses what the project has accomplished over the previous year and what is yet to come.
Talk Sessions
Open edX community members from all over the world are encouraged to submit a talk proposal for one of numerous 45-minute presentation slots available at the conference. These talks will be organized into one of four tracks that roughly correspond to various areas of interest that community members have. These are:
Pedagogy and Instructional Design (for Educators, Course Teams, and Course Operators)
Example Topics of Interest:
- Course authoring, production and promotion techniques
- Innovative courses, especially ones in the fields of higher education, social impact, or professional development & training
- Challenges and solutions for successful online education – what works best in online learning?
- Product Development and Usage (for Product and technology leaders)
Example Topics of Interest:
- At a high level, how do people use the platform? How does the platform work?
- Overview and/or deep dives into new and upcoming features and changes, including how these features are used and what problems they solve
- Trends in online learning and training, for instance: online credentials, professional development, lifelong learning
- Analytics and research
- Where are we now and where do we need to go? How will we get there?
- Developing and Operating (for: Developers working on the platform, those running Open edX instances, technology leaders)
Example topics of interest:
- Technical deep dives into the code or tools used to build and run the platform – assume your audience can read, follow, and create code
- Extending and integrating the platform
- Latest best practices for running a site
Additionally we will have an “Other” track, as we recognize that there are many talks that don’t fit neatly into the above topics. These talks will have short topic descriptions alongside the titles.
You can expect that these talks will be able to dig into a topic at some depth, and that you will be afforded the opportunity to ask questions at the end of the presentation.
Lightning Talks
Lightning talks are talks of 10 minutes or less; 4 of these talks are presented back to back in a 45-minute block. These talks are sometimes broad, sometimes narrowly focused. And of course, some talks are pretty silly! These talks are a great opportunity to get a smattering of different types of information all at once.
Lightning talks will be organized by track (so one block will feature 4 talks that pertain to the same track). If time permits at the end of the four talks, there will be a few minutes for Q&A.
Cocktail Reception
A can’t-miss event of the Open edX conference is the cocktail reception, this year held Wednesday evening at the newly renovated MIT Museum! Relax and mingle with your co-attendees from all over the world – the cocktail reception is a great place to meet new people (and meet people you’ve never met in real life!). The MIT museum only opened to the public in October 2022 and is sure to be a fun and engaging place to explore.
We’re looking forward to shared learnings and conversations with you at the 2023 Open edX Conference. Register for your ticket today!
