Sessions

Opening Remarks: Wednesday, June 24

SONYA CHRISTIAN, California Community Colleges Chancellor

California Community Colleges Chancellor Sonya Christian will provide opening remarks at the 2026 Online Teaching Conference. Chancellor Christian is scheduled to offer system wide insights on the future of online learning and student success, setting the tone for an inspiring conference experience!

General Session: Wednesday June 24

FLOWER DARBY
Joyful Online Teaching: Find Your Fizz to Boost Learning and Success

Let’s face it. Teaching these days is tough. We’re exhausted, burned out, and frustrated by societal challenges like politics and AI. Yet our work is important, meaningful, and worthwhile. We’re changing lives and helping dreams come true. The best way to meet the threat posed by AI to meaningful learning is to center the people in our classes — both ourselves and our students — and focus on fostering collective well-being. Based on Flower’s new book, The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes, this talk will help us see how to promote flourishing and rediscover the joy inherent in transformational teaching and learning.

General Session: Thursday June 25

From Classroom to Career: Mobilizing a Human-First AI Ecosystem
Facilitated by Vice Chancellor CRAIG HAYWARD

The intersection of online education and the modern workforce is being redefined by the paradox of artificial intelligence; it is both a challenge to traditional modes of ensuring academic integrity and a massive opportunity for equity and economic mobility. In this final session, system leaders pull back the curtain on the Vision 2030 workplans to explore the California Community Colleges’ ground game for 2.2 million students and 90,000 committed professionals. Facilitated by Vice Chancellor Craig Hayward, the panel, including Vice Chancellors Tony Cordova, Siria Martinez, and James Todd, will move beyond theory into the lived realities of implementation.

The panelists will share key accomplishments from the past year while addressing a vital question: How do we ensure AI projects deliver on the promise of student success without compromising educational depth? We will explore how the system is leveraging partnerships with Google, IBM, Coursera, Microsoft and others to build high-demand skills, while simultaneously evaluating whether our implementations are fostering human agency or creating new digital divides. Join us for a grounded yet hopeful look at how the California community colleges are navigating the technical and ethical details to ensure AI remains a human-centered force for good in California.