Open as in a (white house) fence

As the pandemic took hold, I found myself even a little more on the sidelines than usual. I watched as folks struggled to make sense of online learning, issues of access, balancing life and home, doing all the juggling. Things that have been my ordinary for… it feels like… forever?

Through it all, I come back to an idea, that somehow we’ve made all of this open learning stuff too hard, while also sometimes maybe missing the point (or maybe forgetting to ask enough what the point ought to be).

Somewhere it the midst of this, I happened upon an extraordinary story. It’s not mine, it belongs to others, many others, people that I will never know in a place I barely know. An example of what I really believe open education might be. When I saw it, I wrote.

This.
As edtech.
As open education.
As open pedagogy.

Outside the fence.
In the world.
Centered around resistance and justice.
Making heard and making known.
Consensual, caring, compassionate.
Giving, sharing.
Living, learning. Small, messy.
Simple.
Wonderful.

Location: Washington D.C. (as seen from Vancouver, Canada)