For this summer, members of Equity Unbound are organizing a virtual conference they describe as a recharge and renewal, “choose your own learning journey” experience. They’re calling it Mid-Year Fest, or #MYFest22 for short. The conference runs May through August and aims to explore open educational practices, open publishing, digital literacies, community building, critical pedagogy, socially just education and activities that support wellbeing and joy.

This conference is for higher education educators, K-12 teachers, educational developers of any kind, librarians, coaches, mentors, and learners everywhere. Organizers are from around the world, and they’re setting up an event with many formats: one-off workshops, deep conversations, hallway/water-cooler chats, and longer learning tracks. There will be asynchronous and synchronous options. The conference is “pay-what-you-can” and “attend-what-you-can.” It’s designed to be inclusive. Organizer Maha Bali describes the conference origins on her blog.

I’ll be attending because I’m already seeing some speakers lined up that I want to hear from, but also because the conference is designed to build community and to be a restorative and joyful space. Almost everyone I know can really use something to help them recharge right now. I hope you’ll join me. I’d love to plan a few things to attend with colleagues.

The website for the conference is still being built, and while the registration isn’t ready, there is an expression of interest form where you can actually influence the conference offerings by selecting the type and format of sessions and activities that interest you the most. You can check out the organizers (former Maricopan Alan Levine is among them) and view the currently planned offerings by month or by theme (see the site menu at the top of the website). Take a look – #MYFest22 could be just the thing to recharge before Fall.