Caring for students in postsecondary open educational resource (OER) and open education initiatives: inviting student participation and voice

Purpose This paper aims to examine librarians’ professional motivations and theoretical perspectives to attend to care and student voice, as they pursue open educational resource (OER) initiatives in higher education. Design/methodology/approach The authors examine OER initiatives that serve as models for their work at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder), describe how they have attended to care and student voice in their work to date and reflect on how they hope to continue to do so in their future OER initiatives. Findings The authors find connections between theoretical perspectives for care in education and the values and ethics of both the open education movement and librarianship. They propose that these connections provide a foundation for librarians to align their professional motivations and practices in support of learning. The authors provide examples of OER programming that attend to care and student voice and offer related strategies for practitioners to consider. Originality/value Librarians at many post-secondary institutions provide critical advocacy and support the adoption, adaptation and creation of OER in higher education. Theories of care, values and ethics in the open education movement and librarianship provide a foundation for librarians to attend to care and elevate student voice as they undertake OER advocacy and initiatives.

The VLE versus Open Education

In this paper we consider the position of the VLE in the context of the open education movement. This paper gathers data from the #VLEIreland survey in order to explore further whether open education was a concern of the academics involved, and if so, how it shaped their use of the local VLE. We will explore the nature of open education and open educational resources (OER), and whether there are interactions between these resources and the VLE. Open educational resources are materials shared online for educators to use and adapt, including full courses, modules, textbooks, and assets such as video clips, images or teaching methods. Data from our staff survey indicates a range of responses to the sharing and use of OERs and a spectrum of understanding (or lack of understanding) of copyright issues. We explore these findings and discuss their implications for OER in the future, and suggest that the ideals of “openness” are challenged by institutional VLEs and other mechanisms for resource sharing in higher education.

The Battle for Open by Martin Weller

“The Battle for Open” by Martin Weller was published on 28 November 2014 and is available in a number of formats from Ubiquity Press. Following the principles of openness, it has been made available under the CC-BY licence which allows one to share the book or even adapt its contents as long as the book is correctly cited.To the reader who is familiar with the discussions promoting open education, the book provides a clear, concise history leading up to the current state of play and the issues that are presently to the fore. If you are a newcomer to the debate, this book would be a good place to start.Weller calls advocates for open access to education to become active in the battle to ensure that the original principles of “openness” are not lost and looks at ways an educational institution might handle the changes brought about by the open education movement. This is an interesting book which looks at the issues of open access in education in depth, is thought-provoking and well worth reading.

Evaluation of Digital Didactic Skills in Massive Open Online Courses: a Contribution to the Latin American Movement

The aim of this article is to present an evaluation of digital teaching skills in a project funded by the National Distance Education System (SINED) in Mexico conducted on a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) which was designed to develop competences in teachers in the distance learning or classroom setting for the integration of open educational resources (OER). The course was conducted by the Regional Open Latin American Community for Social and Educational Research (Clarise), and posed the question: how are distance learning didactic competences using OER developed? The aim was to identify and evaluate how OER were used and the form they took throughout the stages of the open education movement. The study deployed a mixed methodology with instruments such as emailed questionnaires for the MOOC participants, viewing screens in the discussion forums and anecdotal evidence. The results show that MOOC participants were able to develop digital teaching skills, identify how to use OER and how the training process occurs in the open education movement. Constraints to the development of these skills were also seen in the acculturation in the open education movement, as well as limitations on the design of distance learning models that promote these skills and the recognition of informal learning. El objetivo de este artículo es presentar la evaluación de competencias digitales didácticas en el entorno de un proyecto financiado por el Sistema Nacional de Educación a Distancia (SINED) de México, donde se llevó a cabo un curso masivo abierto (Massive Open Online Course: MOOC, por sus siglas en inglés), dirigido a desarrollar competencias en profesores de educación a distancia o presencial para integrar recursos educativos abiertos (REA). El curso se impartió a través de la Comunidad Latinoamericana Abierta Regional de Investigación Social y Educativa (Clarise). Se partió de la interrogante ¿cómo se desarrollan las competencias didácticas en ambientes de aprendizaje a distancia que utilizan REA?, con el fin de identificar y evaluar cómo se usan los REA y cómo se está formando a través de las etapas del movimiento educativo abierto. La metodología empleada fue mixta, con instrumentos de cuestionarios electrónicos para los participantes, rejillas de observación en foros de discusión y registros anecdóticos. Los resultados muestran que los participantes en un MOOC, logran desarrollar competencias digitales didácticas, lográndose identificar claramente cómo se usan los REA y cómo se está dando el proceso de formación en el movimiento educativo abierto; sin embargo, también se denotan limitaciones para el desarrollo de estas competencias, tales como la culturización en el movimiento educativo abierto, el diseño de modelos de aprendizaje a distancia que promuevan las competencias y el reconocimiento del aprendizaje informal.

The Durban University Of Technology's Experiences Of Open Educational Resources

There seems to be growing confidence that the open education movement is set to reshape the higher education landscape. Perhaps the single most formidable challenge retarding the uptake of open education resources (OERs) is instructors' lack of knowledge and experience of these materials. This descriptive case study examines the experiences Durban University of Technology (DUT) faculty have of OERs. As such, it lays the groundwork for subsequent studies of the attitudes of faculty to OERs and to the philosophy of open education. It also interrogates the national and institutional policy environment to establish to what extent these foster a culture of sharing and openness in local higher education. The findings reported here may thus provide a context for understanding the attitudes of DUT faculty to OERs (examined in a separate study) and may serve as useful indicators of how the university is positioned; that is, how deep its foundations are, with respect to its prospects of participating successfully in the higher education OER movement.