Hi everyone,
As we ponder free learning for all students worldwide, the Open Content
Licensing for Educators (#OCL4ED) online course demonstrates a potential
model which may be relevant to implementing the OER university:
- The course is based *solely on OER* (developers decided on a default
CC-BY license except for one or two third party videos licensed under
CC-BY-SA. One can hardly expect a prominent leader of the free software
movement to drop the copyleft provision ;-).)
- Hundreds of learners from +46 countries will be participating for *free
*
- Course materials were developed openly and *collaboratively across
institutional boundaries* (OER Foundation, WikiEducator community,
Creative Commons, and OpenCourseWare Consortium)
- A small investment from UNESCO has ensured completion of resources
which are available for reuse (demonstrating that a small organisational
commitment from participating institutions, eg 1% of the community service
budget can achieve the critical mass of courseware to fill the gaps where we
don't have existing OER.)
- Course materials were developed using *editable and open file formats*.
This is important because:
- It is easier to convert for alternative delivery formats, e.g.
generating printed study guides for learners who may not have
access to the
Internet
- It is easier for participating institutions to reconfigure for local
learning contents including institutional branding (derivative works are
permitted.)
- Using html iframes (an open standard), institutions are free to
teach the courses irrespective of the Learning Management System used on
campus thus avoiding the complexities of SCORM and IMS content cartridges.
- Course development and hosting based on *open source
software*technologies -- no need for any learner or institution to
sacrifice their
freedoms or requirement to purchase software licenses.
While this current example does not carry formal academic credit as a short
professional development workshop, we are not too far off from incorporating
courses like this into formal qualifications. For example, knowledge on
copyright and Creative Commons licenses would conceivably be incorporated
into the learning outcomes, for instance, in a course elective on OER in a
Masters Degree in Educational Technology. All we need is a tertiary
education institution who will use course materials like this in a formal
course for formal credit. We have solved this piece of the puzzle :-). The
anchor partners of the OER university are committed to doing this.
I think Prof Jim Taylor is right when he says the OER university "is not
theoretical speculation, its entirely viable".
Watch this space ..... :-)
BTW if you want to learn more about Creative Commons licensing in Education
-- you're most welcome to join the free workshop:
http://wikieducator.org/Open_content_licensing_for_educators/About
2011 is going to be a quantum shift year for the mainstream adoption of OER
in the formal education sector.
Cheers
Wayne
--
Wayne Mackintosh <http://wikieducator.org/User:Mackiwg>, Ph.D.
Director OER Foundation <http://www.oerfoundation.org>
Director, International Centre for Open Education,
Otago Polytechnic, New Zealand.
Founder and elected Community Council Member,
WikiEducator<http://www.wikieducator.org>
Mobile +64 21 2436 380
Skype: WGMNZ1
Twitter <http://twitter.com/#%21/Mackiwg> |
identi.ca<http://identi.ca/waynemackintosh>
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