OEG Voices 100: Amanda Coolidge

But I've always been one of those people that as a leader incredibly curious about team members and curious about their lifestyle [music] and curious about who they are when they're not at work and and how they can bring themselves to that role regardless of of who they are. Um for me it's just sort of being kind and empathetic and listening. It's a lot of listening to where people are coming from and trying to mitigate any kind of issues where you're feeling like there's a bit of tension, but how can you help intervene on both sides. Um and there are certain times when you just kind of have to make a decision and and stand by it. >> [music] [bell] >> It's time again for another podcast episode of OER Global Voices. The podcast show that we produce here at Open Education Global. Each episode we try to bring you conversation style people, practices, and ideas from open educators all around the world. And this is a very special episode. I like to think they're all special, but this one is specially special because it's episode number 100. And as we got up to the high 90s, I was really trying to plan who would be an ideal guest to have to take us over into the three digit mark. And it was perfect that we lined up this conversation with Amanda Coolidge, an amazing open educator who you will see and hear from many aspects of her life and career and way of thinking in this conversation. We recorded this way back in June 22nd, 2026. I don't know where the time went. Amanda was recognized last year with an Open Education Award for Excellence as a compassionate leader. We'll hear about her ideas on leadership, her way of thinking, her background, what motivates her, what it's like to live in an RV and travel and work and move across the world and be a parent and a loving caring family member and the work that she's doing now with Pressbooks. Okay, I'm giving the whole show away, but now let's get to the conversation. >> [music] >> First of all, um hello Amanda. This is just like us having a conversation and uh but you know, I'm forgetting not everybody knows you, so introduce yourselves and and tell us where in the world you are right now. >> Yeah, hi. So, I'm Amanda Coolidge and I am the uh VP of strategic engagement and growth at Pressbooks. Um uh formally with uh BCcampus in British Columbia, Canada and I am located right now in Victoria, British Columbia and specifically on the Saanichton First Nations uh land, which is very near the airport and the ferry and in a beautiful spot by the ocean. >> Awesome. I think I know where that is. We know where you are on a map, but do you mind describing because um I can see you, but our podcast audience can't. Can you describe your surroundings right now? >> Sure. So, I live full-time in an RV and what I'm seeing outside right now is beautiful green and bright blue skies. Um I'm also seeing somebody coming here for a tree removal service, [clears throat] so that's nice and loud a little bit in the background. Um but yeah, it's beautiful and lush and just so sunny. We've had great really wonderful warm weather and uh if you go about I don't know, a kilometer down the road, it's just where the front of the beach is. If you've ever been to a beach in the Pacific Northwest, it's fairly like rocky and and gray sand um and the water is very very cold but it's delightful. >> I like how quickly you said that and and like it's such a fascinating thing and I don't know if you want to talk about it. You live in an RV. How how does that work? >> I'll give you the history of it. So during COVID 2020 we had a RV a fifth wheel and we decided we wanted to live in it full-time and not because we were going anywhere in particular but just because we liked the small living and just sort of being able to move around if we wanted to. My son was in grade two at the time and he's now almost in high school. We have a 42 foot fifth wheel that basically looks like on the inside it looks like an apartment, you know. And I work from the kitchen table and my son goes to public school nearby and in the summer months we hit the road and travel and I still work remotely. When he's off of school we also try to travel and and hit the road. >> I I know it's like that's ordinary for you but it's just it's fascinating and I commend you for balancing the life and having to work from the road and >> Starlink has made it a lot easier. That's for sure. Before that it was a lot of you know you were you were sort of like doubling up on your cell phone coverage because you were never sure if you were going to get anything or miss anything. I think we've done a good job of making it work. I mean it's been really lovely for my son in terms of growing up in this environment and knowing that you can have everything you need within a small space and he gets to enjoy the best of both worlds. >> That it kind of parallels with what I know about you. You traveled a lot as a kid. So, where did you spend your your early childhood years and what kind of student were you in school, too? I'm interested to know. >> I spent my early years in England, Poland, Northern Virginia, and Pakistan. And the reason I did that is because my dad was in the foreign service. And so, we traveled, you know, every 4 years to different countries and it was a really fabulous experience. As a student, I was never really a strong student. I wasn't one of those people that like got straight A's automatically, but I worked very hard. I'm firstborn child. So, and I'm a people-pleaser. So, I worked hard. I always wanted to do my best and I wanted to make sure that, you know, I was trying my best in everything. Um I think I was, you know, pretty outgoing, sometimes a little too, you know, loud or outspoken for some of the teachers, but generally, you know, played by the rules and always been a rule follower. Yeah, there's nothing really mischievous or interesting about piece. >> Oh, it is interesting. I ask everybody that question and it's fascinating to hear how people describe it. And and just as a follow-up, if young Amanda met current Amanda, what might young Amanda say or ask you? >> Um I think they would be surprised that I live in an RV, but I think that they would be like really impressed with the unique factor of it and and sort of being like, "Oh, wow, that's cool." I think they'd also be really impressed that I have a son who's an athlete. Um and he plays a lot a lot of basketball. I was an athlete um up until high school and my dad played college basketball. And so, I think that would be really interesting to me. Um I think little Amanda would be pretty proud of where where I've come, like where I'm at. >> Fantastic. And uh I I know this story, um and I found it recently, your 2019 um Open Ed Conference keynote. But, like, what was your calling, or what introduced you to open education? >> When I first started really becoming involved in open education, it was probably 2006. Um before that, I had sort of dabbed with it, and it was fairly new. I mean, at that time, it was David Wiley talking about learning objects, and and there was always this, you know, how can you modularize the content and be able to share that content in a way. Um in 2006, I wanted to change jobs. I was working in Calgary, Alberta. And so, I applied for a job um with the African Virtual University and the Open University UK, which is very timely because they're having their OER UK conference today at the Open University. I moved to Nairobi, Kenya to work on a project with the African Virtual University, the BBC, and the Open University to develop the first uh open education repository for teachers in sub-Saharan Africa. And the coolest part of that project was that it was um teacher educators in the sub-Saharan region designing and writing the curriculum um specific to their region. And we developed the curriculum in six different languages across the various countries. That was a really cool experience, just to see how the power of open could be used and shared, and how people were thinking about open at the time. and it was also really interesting to me as well, because I actually went to it was before it became open education global, and I went to what was called an open courseware consortium meeting. And at that meeting, um, you know, it was um, folks from Creative Commons and folks from MIT Open Courseware, and David Wiley was there. A lot of people representing North American uh, viewpoints when it came to open education. They were really um, focused more on the technology and on the repositories. And I remember thinking that in my case, I was just trying to figure out how could someone access an offline version of the content if they were somewhere in rural Rwanda, or could they actually, you know, access it on a Nokia phone? Um, it was just an interesting sort of difference when you hear what's happening in North America versus elsewhere in the world. >> I'm wondering when when you described that, um, to some degree there's still a little bit of that, because for for most of of the world it just means access to material to help them learn or or course content and experiences and all the things, um, and not as much the licenses and the history and the ORs and all that. Um, so, uh, rather interesting that's that's how it was. >> There's a great story. I don't know if they're still around, but there was an open textbook development group in South Africa, and they are called Siyavula. They worked in the K through 12, uh, arena, mainly in STEM, so science and math. And I remember talking to their CEO, asking questions about like, how are people accessing the content in some of these remote areas of South Africa? And and he said it was super interesting. They had a physics book, and when they looked at the analytics, it was getting pinged almost every day at the same time um in this very remote region of South Africa in a village, but it would be consistent. It was just a consistent ping. It was consistent, consistent, consistent. And they actually had the opportunity to go to this remote village because they were like, "There's got to be a story here." Well, sure enough, it turned out that this kid found the Siyavula website or information, and he would take his old cell phone, he would run up to the top of a hill at at like 4:30 every day. At the top of the hill was where he would be able to access a little bit of cell coverage. Every day he would go through like a chapter of that physics information because he found that it was more helpful than what he was getting at school, and then he'd run back down, you know, for bedtime and stuff. It was such a great story about well, the perseverance of a kid and the resiliency to like want to learn something and run up and grab that, but also that power of you never know what's going to happen with the open material if you if you allow it to be open, right? >> Oh, I love that story. Um I mean, I'm curious, too. I mean, you mentioned some names, but um I'd like to know like, you know, who or what were really key influences, especially um early in your career in in openness. >> Yeah, so Eric cuz it was very early on when he was talking about open licensing, and he really was the one to sort of spearhead the idea of moving from open source to open education. Um so, him for sure. Um another um really influential person when I started at Mary Burgess, who before I was executive director was the executive director and really sort of spearheaded the whole open textbook project. Um got that going with governments and and really wanting to move forward with that. Um in terms of other people also Kathy Casserly from the Hewlett Foundation. The Kathy was the first Hewlett Foundation program officer for open education back in 2006-2007 was actually the program officer for the work that I was doing. So also very influential and very um knowledgeable about what was happening and one thing I always really appreciate about Kathy is just a real curiosity about how how how that work is. Um I mean Alan I would say you too. Like I followed you forever when you were at the digital media consortium. And I always loved reading your work and and then sort of following the interactions on the comments between you and Clint or you and you know Dave Cormier or all of these folks. So there's a real strong mentorship. You know I know I'm blanking on a bunch of names of people who've influenced me but those would be the ones that come to mind for sure. >> You're too kind and it sounds like I I I I didn't influence Amanda Sneling there. Uh but I have to say like in my early career the connection to a lot of Canadian educators was was really key for for so many things. So I'm glad to be here now in the country. >> Yeah well it's probably like a foreshadowing. It was like you're just like working your way up here. >> Okay so give us some some of the stops cuz this quite a trail. After the project in Africa what are the timeline points in your career? >> After I was done in Africa I decided to head to Vancouver and the reason I moved to Vancouver is because my sister was living there. Um I then started working at BCIT. I was working in their learning and teaching center and actually that's where I met Tannis Morgan. So back in >> Mhm. >> 2009 or something. Um I worked there for a little bit and then after that I ended up going to Royal Roads to be an instructional designer. Royal Roads University was one of the first hybrid style universities where you could do online distance education and also attend in person for residency. So that was really interesting. That had moved me to Vancouver Island in 2010. I stayed at Royal Roads for a few years and then I moved to BC campus. Um, and then since BC campus I um, started my own business called Coolage Collaborative and still doing contract work through my group there and then um, also joined Pressbooks recently. So been working with them as well. Um, I mean >> That's good. We got the highlights. >> Well, you're doing the highlight reel. >> Well, last year you got the Open Education Award for Excellence as a compassionate leader. This is part of the way we allowed people to name their reward. So whoever nominated you came up with that title. They knew something about you. What what does that mean to you to to be described as a leader who's compassionate? >> Well, that was definitely an honor. I felt like that was such a beautiful tribute and exactly how I'd want to be called. For me it it means um, being authentic but also being and when I say authentic it's sort of authentic to who I am, like what my values are and mine are, you know, community and family and relationships are really important to me. Um, but I've always been one of those people that as a leader incredibly curious about team members and curious about their lifestyle and curious about who they are when they're not at work and and how they can bring themselves to that role regardless of of who they are. Um, but then also just kind of the values of caring and you know, when people aren't feeling well, it's very simple for them, especially when they work remote, they feel like it's easy for them. No, no, I'll just do a few things. I have always sort of felt like no, rest is the only way that you'll ever get better and we don't want you to have any burnout or feel poorly. For me, it's just sort of being kind and empathetic and listening. It's a lot of listening to where people are coming from and trying to mitigate any kind of issues where you're feeling like there's a bit of tension, but how can you help intervene on both sides? Um, and there's certain times when you just kind of have to make a decision and and stand by it. >> Going from, you know, doing that inside of an organization, you know, I know BC Campus isn't big, but it's it's got a lot of moving parts in terms of people and projects. I know you're not in that role anymore, but what what would you say would, you know, enable you to continue that now and feels like there's even more pressure and people are more stressed. Um, we can name all the things that people are feeling the pressure for. Um, you know, how would you continue that um sort of mode of leadership style? >> Well, for me, I've had great leaders before who model what compassion looks like. So, and I tried to do that as well, which is uh modeling mental health days and being very open and honest in Slack or in Teams and just saying, "Hey everybody, I just need to take time for myself today and I'm taking a mental health day." And for that to be from the leader going out to the team so that they know, "Okay, that's something that's possible and I can do that." Um, the other thing too is, you know, making sure that when you're not in the {quote} {unquote} office hour time that you, you know, either schedule those messages or um sometimes I had put for a while on my email signature, you know, if this email comes to you at a time that's not during your work hours, please don't feel like you have to respond right away. I think that's important. Another thing too is a lot of times people I find they just want to be heard and appreciated. Sometimes I think we forget that in the rush of everything. It's It's almost like forgetting just to say thank you if someone hands you something or delivers something. And for a while there when I was at BC campus, I would send handwritten thank you notes to people and put them in the mail and be very specific about like, "Oh, when you did this, I really appreciated that." Or thank you for for doing that. So that was helpful. And when I go on vacation, I tune out. I remember especially as an executive director, you feel very nervous about tuning out, but I said, "You know, here's my phone number and if something is really bad, you can send me a note, but I think a lot of it is mirroring um the boundaries that you you personally want and how those boundaries get shown to the rest of the work. >> It shows the people that you work with that you trust them enough to not rely on you to be there when you when you want to take that break, right? So um tell us what you're doing now at Pressbooks. When I heard the announcement, I was very excited like, "A man is going to be at Pressbooks." So what are you working on? >> Well, well, first of all, I love it. It's been a fun challenge. So I am working on the customer success team. I get to work with the marketing lead, the sales lead, the customer experience lead, and the marketing team and sales team. And that's great. They're amazing individuals who just get stuff done and do it in such a values-driven way of thinking about how to how to do this work. Um so, I've been working on that team. I'm also helping out and building up a new product that we're working on. So, we are developing a new product, uh a micro-credential authoring platform. And that micro-credential authoring platform, we're doing a pilot in the fall with Maricopa Community College, your old haunts. And uh Bank of America, and we're really excited about that. Um that's been really fun to work with the design team and the development team and really think of ways that we can um incorporate pieces of the Pressbooks platform, but then also create something that's a little bit more unique and skills-driven. Um and hopefully an opportunity for folks to see, you know, what are the benefits there. Um one of the things that I've loved being able to do is use my instructional design hat again in that work and thinking about um you know, as I design a course, what are the things that I would want and wanting to really have the entire design framework be based on the competencies and skills at the outset versus an afterthought. And so, that's been an interesting way for us to develop and build this work. Um so, been doing that and then I get to um you know, attend conferences and see uh people in the open community regularly where I get to either talk about Pressbooks or work with others to share their Pressbooks stories. And then people create the most incredible pieces of work. Um and they use tools and platforms in ways that sometimes you don't even expect, you know? >> That's often the most exciting part. >> Um uh well, obviously we're really intrigued to hear about this new micro-credential platform and hope we can work with you to line up a demo or a preview or just whatever information we can share, you know. Um so, if you know, when we say Pressbooks, they think of the the book with the red cover, and they know what a Pressbook is, like, but what might not people know about, you know, the organization itself or what it's like to be inside Pressbooks? >> So, the organization itself, it's the CEO, uh her name is Book Shock, and um it is an organization that has an incredible uh honestly, the best uh work experience or um way it treats its employees is is absolutely remarkable in terms of things like, you know, time off and different allowances and being able to uh work 4 days a week. It's a 4-day-a-week company, and they're just very much um staff and people-focused first. Uh obviously, that creates a lot of loyalty at at the organization. Um it's really inspiring how Book Shock has created this sort of foundation for an organization that um you know, speaking of boundaries, has a boundary where it's called No Meeting Tuesday. So, Tuesday is like your head's down work, you know, get what you need done because Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday are usually full of meetings. It's either with external clients or internally if you're trying to build things or trying to work on things. And Tuesdays, it's such a great time internally, like, you can Slack message someone, and you're not worried about interrupting them during a meeting. You can just sort of say, "Hey, I'm working on this. I need some troubleshooting help or something." Um that's been really cool to see how different organizations like actually function and how they how they how they work. The other thing I've loved is that Pressbooks is very international organization. So, we're based in Montreal, um, Canada. Uh, but everyone lives everywhere, you know, Victoria, Edmonton, Winnipeg, um, Ontario, Mexico, Spain. Yeah, it's great. It's, uh, it's a neat way, I mean, you have that, too, the sort of the remote, the international remote work situation. >> That's going to stay with me, the no meetings Tuesdays. It's like simple, but it, it's effective. And And you get to hang with Steel Wag stuff? >> I get to hang out a lot with Steel. Yeah. >> Oh, I love Steel. Tell him hello. He's a great soul. >> He He is on my team, and, um, he is a good soul. He's actually right now at, um, a World Cup game yesterday with his son. So, he's on vacation this week. It's been a nice group of humans to interact with and be a part of their their organization and and get to see how things, you know, work. And and just sort of the different values that they've brought to the work that they do. >> Okay, uh, maybe a big question, I don't know, impossible to answer. Like, you know, we've covered your career, Art. Like, how would you characterize or say the state of the open education ecosystem? Uh, what are you worried about and what what are you optimistic about? >> I am worried that open education, with all of the institutional higher education budget cuts, I mean, there's a lot in Canada, there's a lot in the United States, and then you see it sort of trickling outside of of North America and Mexico. I'm worried that open education is going to be a line on a budget that people who don't understand the impact of open education will just erase from the budget. And the reason I say that is because it's very easy for people who aren't the end user being the student to make decisions on someone else's behalf without understanding the real impact of that. And I think we saw that you know, most recently the campus Manitoba um shutting down and they lost funding and will be closing at the end of this week. What's super interesting about that and I'll get back to what else excites me, but this is one thing that excites me actually. I was just there at a conference um last week and the community that they have built in the Manitoba institutions, it's very clear to me that the work that they um started their foundation with an open education will not go away. There was this real drive and like a fighting energy to keep the work continuing, so that's exciting. Um I think what excites me is that I'm starting to hear a lot more conversations about how does open um integrate within other aspects of the academy or even outside of the academy. And Paul Stacey has talked about this for years. Looking at where does the open ecosystem fit and what's the conversation look like without it just being open education, but like where's the intersection with open science and open access and open licensing and open uh GLAM and all of these different intersections why are we always just siloing ourselves in this one small area? And so for me I think that's something I'm excited about. I've heard a lot more conversations especially around I'm in this work right now, but in workforce development and micro-credentials and talking about what could it look like as an open ecosystem, what could it look like outside of an open ecosystem um because we're sort of at this pivotal point of being very concerned about budgets and funding, it's been a real interesting to see people rise up to try to figure out alternative ways of of open education um that's a bit more broad than what we've seen before as the specific open textbook or open resource. >> today is actually the the deadline for the award nominations and >> Oh. >> they've actually been pouring in. Like I I have to go check, but we'll have more than last year. We're closing in on 200. Of course, this will be edited afterwards, but as an awardee, what what might you tell someone to to like go to the bother of um uh nominating actually someone else for an award? >> Okay, I would say it is absolutely true that the majority of open education work and happens off the side of people's desk. I think that the only way that the work can be on somebody's desk or can be continued to be funded or to continue to be that budget line on on someone's uh budget is the act of recognition. When you nominate someone at your institution or in your organization or someone even outside of your organization who you're seeing does great work, it adds to both their recognition and for them realizing that the work that they've been doing is important to the world. Um but it also signals to their organization or to their institution that the work that they're doing is important for the world. It really goes a long way in terms of um being able to continue to support and advocate for open education. It's just a great way to just honor people's work and honor the projects that they've been doing. Um yeah, for me, I mean, it's it's a lovely tribute. >> We discussed earlier about how you approach to think about like gratitude internally. >> Yeah. >> And um we were trying to shift this because it's always been like I want to give an award because I'll get some recognition. Of course, everybody wants to get an award, right? But um trying to shift it to like just what it means to give someone else the recognition. Um and I like to think like if more people give, then more people would get. And so, you know what? We I was surprised when I start working on the project is that um we'd get, you know, 100 to 200 nominations, and we'd only see a subset. So, you know, the first thing was make sure we see everybody and everything who's nominated because that's a value. Um and it also says to me like that people don't really give a lot of recognition, you know, big or small. No one gets too much recognition. So, there's there's that out there. And thinking, too, um cuz I've been reading all the nominations as they come in, and it goes back to, you know, talking about your um earlier work on when you started um in Kenya. And you'll see this because you've agreed to be a reviewer. Um trying to get reviewers to think about like um you know, not comparing one nomination to another or like how does this compare to other work? Like just on its own. Is there something uh that jumps out at you that sparks some reason to sort of like give this person some recognition? And And that's hard because we end up trying to weigh like is this impressive or is it compelling or does it sound like it's having an impact? And I don't know if all that is really as important as like is it interesting? Is it like in its own context compelling? >> I like that. I think that's like the power also of when you're talking about gratitude and sort of sharing that open gratitude is your uh project on the hat tip. You know, you sort of had these postcards that were a hat tip to other people. Um I really do think that at this time when we go back to that idea of um you know, people being extremely stressed or just overwhelmed or uh all of the above, that act of gratitude is so impactful for others and for yourself. I mean, when you give somebody a gift, it's like my favorite thing. You know, sometimes I'll go buy like somebody a gift for their birthday and I'm just like, "I just want to tell you what I got you right now." You know, cuz I'm so excited for their response or or you know, it just makes me happy to know that I've done something for somebody else. >> Yeah, those small things that when you talked about you know, your act of giving handwritten notes and I know you and Mary Dee Ball both do this and and kind of join the same level. My sister just she sends me postcards like every 2 weeks and it's so remarkable and it's like, "Judy, I can't keep up." And she's like, "I'm not trying to make you keep up, but she enjoys doing that." That's small and novel to send someone a postcard. I've been mulling in the back of my mind that you know, the awards are one thing, but it takes a lot of effort. You have to write a nomination and submit all this stuff. And I have in my mind for some kind of smaller scale vehicle at the level of the hat tip where you can just, you know, fill out a form and it and it creates a personalized message to someone to say like, "Thank you, Amanda. You know, just out of that conversation, you gave me so many ideas." Or you know, when you can say to your your librarians at your college to say like, "You know, your work on doing the accessibility review was was immense." And like, you know, and there are systems for doing that, but I don't think we have too much. >> I don't think so, either. But I do think there is something about, you know, that either that email or that handwritten note or even a Post-it note, you know, >> Yeah. >> But yeah, we talked about that. That was the small things in that >> Yeah, that's right. Small things podcast. >> So, what are your interests and hobbies when when you're not working and and and driving across the country? >> As I mentioned, my son is a basketball player, and so what that means I'm at a lot of basketball gyms, and it it has turned into a hobby of mine as well. And I think it's also because it's like connection time is like if there's some sport on that is of interest to him, I will watch any sport in order to have that time together. Um but also outside of um work, I have a really wonderful uh gym community, fitness community, and um that really inspires me and keeps me going. I'm excited about that. Um I do some watercolor painting, which I really enjoy, and I love reading. So, I'm a big reader. Um >> What wait what what What kind of stuff do you like to read for pleasure? >> Well, kind of a range. I love just general fiction. Um I like historical fiction, and then I also like like romantic fantasy. >> Mhm. >> You know, yeah. Like Fourth Wing, all that jazz. Yeah, big into that. >> Great. >> Yeah, I devour books, and I love reading. I find I don't really have a shortage of um what to do on my downtime. >> So, you're not bored is what you're saying. >> No. Not No, not at all. >> Well, thank you so much. It's just a it's just a joy to talk to you. I would do this whether we're doing a podcast or not, but it's a bonus. I get to share our conversation with the world. >> Yeah, thank you. Well, thanks for inviting me, and I do hope people get their nominations in on time, and I look forward to reviewing what's ahead. >> Wow, what an episode number 100. Thank you for listening to OEG Global Voices, the podcast from Open Education Global. Each episode features a different musical intro track selected from the Free Music Archive. Thinking about today's show and Amanda's travel, I found one called Back on the Road by TRG Banks under a CC0 Universal License, purely public domain, one of the best licenses out there. You can find this episode at our site voices.oeglobal.org and you can join follow-up discussion on our OEJA Connect Community or wherever you interact with us in social media. If you're listening and like to share your open education work or suggest a future guest or give us any other kind of feedback, we're really desperate to hear from you. You can find us on our website or email to voices@oeglobal.org. Thanks and looking forward to getting to episode 101 coming up soon. >> [music]