Opening Keynote: Making the Case to Connect the Opens

"As we open Knowledge Equity and Open Scholarship Week 2026, we begin with a shared question which will accompany us throughout the week: ‘how can we bridge the Opens?’

Across institutions and academic communities, Open Access, Open Science, Open Education and Open Infrastructure have made progress. Yet too often, they evolve in parallel rather than in partnership. What might be possible if we moved beyond these silos and began to connect them more intentionally? Drawing on SPARC Europe’s recent positioning paper, The Case for Connecting the Opens, this session will explore how a more coordinated, values-driven approach can unlock synergies, reduce fragmentation, and build more equitable and impactful knowledge systems for all. Here's a link to the Case for Connecting the Opens:  

https://zenodo.org/records/17572650 "