This year’s Affordable Learning Summit, hosted by the Academic Libraries of Indiana’s Affordable Learning Initiative (ALI), offered attendees an opportunity to engage with local and regional conversations about open education. By pairing virtual programming from OpenCon Ohio 2026 with locally organized activities at IU Wells Library, the summit created a welcoming space for connection, creativity, and community-building.
While open education is often associated with affordable textbooks and openly licensed materials, but at its core, it is about creating learning environments that are accessible, collaborative, and responsive to the needs of diverse communities (Baskin and Nourse 2025, 2-3). This year’s Affordable Learning Summit, hosted at Indiana University, brought those values to life by reimagining what a conference experience could be.
The summit brought together librarians, instructional designers, and advocates for affordable learning to engage with virtual programming from OpenCon Ohio 2026. While the day’s sessions explored topics such as open educational resources, accessibility, artificial intelligence, and the future of teaching and learning, the local ALI experience extended those conversations beyond those on screen.
Rather than expecting participants to engage with the event in a single way, the summit embraced one of the central principles of open education: meaningful participation looks different for everyone (CAST 2024). Attendees could join the virtual OpenCon Ohio sessions, participate in optional in-person breakout discussions, take part in interactive “Screen Break” activities, or spend time creating (by coloring openly licensed coloring books, or creating fidgets with beads and pipe cleaners). For example, these creative activities created opportunities for participants to engage with tactile and low-pressure ways to process ideas while connecting with colleagues.
Each activity offered a different way to engage with the ideas discussed throughout the day. Recognizing that reflection, creativity, and conversation are all valuable forms of learning. In particular, the optional “Screen Break” activities encouraged participants to pause, reflect, and contribute their own perspectives by journaling. Through these prompts, attendees became active contributors to the event rather than passive listeners gathering information. These moments created opportunities for participants to share experiences, exchange ideas, and build connections with one another across institutions and professional roles.
This flexibility reflects a broader goal of open education: reducing barriers to participation. Just as we practice with our students by removing financial barriers for students with open textbooks, open educational practices encourage learning environments that accommodate different needs, preferences, and ways of engaging (Cronin 2017, 16-17). By offering multiple avenues for participation, the summit acknowledged that there is no single “right way” to learn, collaborate, or contribute to a professional community.
In many ways, the format of the ALI Affordable Learning Summit embodied the same principles that guide the open education movement. With optional breakout conversations, smaller groups created focused discussions, while this was later reinforced through the shared meal creating opportunities for participants to continue conversations and form new connections. It demonstrates that conferences designed with openness and collaboration in mind can foster meaningful conversations, strengthen connections, and deepen collective understanding.
SCREEN BREAKS ZINE
References:
Baskin, G. & Nourse, K. V., (2025) “Exploring Student & Faculty Engagement with an OER Textbook in First-Year Composition”, Journal of Open Educational Resources in Higher Education 3(3), 1-20. doi: https://doi.org/10.31274/joerhe.20077
CAST (2024). CAST Universal Design for Learning Guidelines version 3.0. Retrieved from https://udlguidelines.cast.org
Cronin, C. (2017). Openness and praxis: Exploring the use of open educational practices in higher education. International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 18(5), 15-34.
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