MYFest 2026: Schedule

Teaching with a chronic illness means belonging to a profession that demands always being “on” while navigating a body that needs constant rest, stillness, and care. This facilitated reflective workshop uses prompted free writing and open discussion to examine that tension honestly and to build practical strategies for teaching with greater agency and resilience. It welcomes educators living this experience and those who want to support them.

In the middle of busy days, even a few moments of stillness can make a big difference. This recurring 10 minute guided meditation offers a space to pause, breathe, be mindful and gently reconnect with yourself. Whether you are new to meditation, looking to build a steady practice or long-time meditator, you’ll be guided through a calming experience designed to reduce stress and help enhance your presence. Come as you are – no prior experience needed, just a willingness to slow down and be.

Can a machine make us feel seen, understood, or cared for? This session explores the psychology behind our growing attachment to AI, examining how technologies designed to respond like humans can activate powerful emotional connections and reshape the way we think about relationships, intimacy, and belonging.

The aim of this series of sessions is to create a safe space in community with one another to engage in healing conversations around topics of import to our individual and collective well-being. Topics are intended to address issues common to the human experience in these trying times. The hope is that these sessions invite introspection and dialogue to deepen connection and solidarity, and inspire hope, healing and transformation.
Topic 1: Building community through embracing diversity and connecting with the ‘other’
Topic 2: Centering joy in our lives during trying times
Topic 3: Embracing vulnerability for building connection and belonging

Join me for a short calming and reflective journaling session designed to help you reconnect and recharge. Through thoughtfully written prompts and individual quiet reflection time, we’ll journal about gratitude, self-love, loving-kindness and wellbeing. Whether you’re a long-tome journaler or just getting started, this space invites you to slow down, tune in and leave feeling lighter, clearer and more connected. Bring a notebook, an open heart and come just as you are.

In this session, we will offer some principles of designing hybrid events in ways that are intentionally equitable and also engaging for both online and in-person participants. The session builds on the IEH praxis of Virtually connecting (which was hybrid). Participants will have opportunities to reflect on the best and worst hybrid experiences they have had, and reimagine a particular upcoming event as intentionally equitable hybrid.

In the middle of busy days, even a few moments of stillness can make a big difference. This recurring 10 minute guided meditation offers a space to pause, breathe, be mindful and gently reconnect with yourself. Whether you are new to meditation, looking to build a steady practice or long-time meditator, you’ll be guided through a calming experience designed to reduce stress and help enhance your presence. Come as you are – no prior experience needed, just a willingness to slow down and be.

These sessions will be thematic and bring together 2-3 emerging scholars (i.e. somewhere between proposal stage of a PhD and recently completed it) to share their research in 10 minutes, followed by a discussion that is focused on questions the scholars themselves pose for the audience (e.g. requesting feedback, etc.)

This session shares our journey of writing a book chapter (under review) entitled: A Praxis of Emergence and Intentional Adaptation at Equity Unbound. We will share our full autoethnographic narratives ahead of time, and during the session share excerpts from them and share with participants key insights we gained from our writing. We will then invite participants to share with us how they think IEH may transfer to other contexts, and the challenges they have faced or expect to face when trying to apply it in different communities.

Join me for a short calming and reflective journaling session designed to help you reconnect and recharge. Through thoughtfully written prompts and individual quiet reflection time, we’ll journal about gratitude, self-love, loving-kindness and wellbeing. Whether you’re a long-tome journaler or just getting started, this space invites you to slow down, tune in and leave feeling lighter, clearer and more connected. Bring a notebook, an open heart and come just as you are.