The Festival of Learning is BC’s “big-tent” event, celebrating teaching and learning in post-secondary education. We have built a reputation for offering an incredibly welcoming, creative, intellectually stimulating environment where everyone and their teaching and learning interests are included.

For the first time this year, the Program Committee is inviting input on deciding the high-level event theme. Regardless of which high-level theme is chosen, the idea is it will create a broad container (“big tent”!) for a variety of sessions on key topics in post-secondary teaching and learning today, such as:

 - Teaching and Learning Practices, Student Learning, Course Design, Pedagogy, Scholarly Teaching and Learning
 - Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
 - Access and Accessibility
 - Decolonizing and Indigenizing Education
 - International Education
 - Open Education
 - Educational Technology
 - Trades Education
 - Co-operative Education and Work-Integrated Learning

So again, no matter what theme you vote on below, you can expect most or all of the above to be represented in the Festival program.

Please vote for the high-level theme (as described below), you believe will make for the best conference and learning experience for the BC post-secondary community in May 2020. Voting will close on July 10th.


*Creativity and Destruction in Higher Education*
"Every act of creation is first an act of destruction". - Pablo Picasso.  While we may think of “destruction” as chaotic, unstable or uncertain, it is also often what sparks new directions, ideas and creativity. What are we  - or ought to be - creating and destroying in BC post-secondary education today? What could we stop doing (“destroy”) in order to make space for something new? What practices, policies, beliefs, relationships, collaborations, tools or spaces need to be created, destroyed or re-imagined to help us do our best work in supporting student learning?


*Disruption and Transformation in Teaching & Learning*
The ideas of “disruption” and “transformation” invite us to think ultimately about change, which seems constant in our field and beyond.  And at the same time, how can we embrace change and hang on to what currently works?  Regardless of what area you work in (see list above: teaching, learning, ed tech, open education, accessibility, trades, etc…), there is probably a lot to say about disruption and transformation in your practices, tools, priorities, etc.


*Expression!*
This word evokes diversity, creativity, and communication.  How/are we inviting all members of our PSE community to express themselves and their learning?  How/are our values and priorities expressed in the policies, practices and spaces that shape teaching and learning? How/are we inviting expression from all voices and all ways of knowing? As our world and our work becomes more complex, how can attending to expressions of various types help us navigate change while creating safe, inclusive, productive learning environments for all students?  


*Expression & Harmony*
Together, these words invite us to think about collaboration and working together.  How do acts of expression (expressing yourself and inviting others to express themselves) both challenge and bring about harmony? How can we create harmony between diverse needs with the services and supports we provide?  What about harmonizing in the trades? Or the transition to the new BC K-12 curriculum and beyond? Or including in our work many ways of being, learning and knowing? Who might we partner with to make progress with these and other challenges?