How open is “open”?

Vision Terms• Hard to be open in peer review world•Open needed for dig. School•Open can make you feel good

Open

Benefit in wider involvement & input

In most aspects, research, teaching, communication, technology “ open is not just a ‘nice to have’ of social learning

Is this about us being ‘open’ or about looking at how people learn in a world that is increasingly becoming ‘open’ to our learners? – need to consider different interpretations of title.

Increased quality of research …

outputs

What is openness?• Flexibility and accommodating research ideas and methods.

How open is open

No barriers

“Free love” i.e. sharing + collaborate on ideas etc

How open is open?

What is okay to share –

How early to release a bright idea to others.

Open – social

equity

social justice

How open is open?

Disadvantage

Yesterday we talked about content/research being used incorrectly, so we must ensure research output is complete / true / checked before opening it up externally for the reputation of OU

Legal barriers to being “Open” – IPR, etc Resistance to beig public / open about results before time to analyse / conclude

How open is open?• open to strangers?•Open to friends? (sounds good)•These could be partners in other projects, fellows ( Glascal + SCORE)•Does this make us feel exposed?•What can’t be open?

Problems at design by committee

How open is open? A. Santos

‘openness’ is a funnel model of education: Open entry – d narrow exit

What makes the student to go through the exit is the ‘support’ shouldn’t the question be: “what will support look like”

PracticesHow open is open?

It’s open enough if the ‘openness’ of the intervention is enough to make it succeed.

Q3•Access (experimentation), participation, reflection•Challenges on ownership, ethics of research, quality

Open

Benefit in learning from our real experiences, challenges

How open is open?

Open thinking, generous sharing of ideas, resources, etc.

Risks must be carefully managed and processes/expectations made explicit

Embarassment How open is open?

Benefit

Raises profile of OU and it’s research.

Benefits to it’s teaching Research conclusions fed into international courses in IET

How open is open?• What happens if participants want to take research in a direction not originally intended?

Open• Free speech• Time for reflection• Access to peers

No advantes in participation How open?• Open source• Use and dissemination of open standards• Contribute to research open source projects•Contribute to standards

Open

(+) Improved internal (!)

Coherence

• It make software open source, people have expectations about support•Already security considerations•You are also exposing yourselves inhouse – good thing as learn from it, but need to have right mindset to deal with it

Open

(-) Time taken to get stuff open

Open

Disadvantage –

Need for confidence to expose work to criticism!

Potential ‘failure’

RESULTS IN FALLING STUDENT NUMBERS

How open is open

Quality controlled

Protecting IP

Available to anybody in any sector – not just HE

COMMUNICATION

Communicating outputs clearly, Good projects

Work if: - plan in place and followed, - communication is good

For success: public documentation of work as it progresses (blogs, wikis etc)

Improves external perception of the OU

Research work, Practicing what we preach, Recognition,Room to play

What will make the research programme work? a) Collaboration between projects, b) Innovative research methods, c) Innovative ways of publicising what we do

What would make it work? Good communication – and using the best tools to aid communication between different projects in the programme and beyond.

Succeed? Giving opportunities for researchers to interact + learn about each others research

Work: Internet impact, - Recognition, - Practice change

COLLECTIVITYWhat would make it work? Popularise, Engagement, Buy-in from groups traditionally excluded i.e. disabled, educationally, disadvantaged, 3rd world. Publicity – positive – Govt singing our praises. Generating lots of moneyAcademic reputation (papers, outputs, good courses)

What will make the research programme work? Genuine advantages in participation, Time to participate or efficiency savings, A focus on empirical & theoretical work, Shared goals / deliverables

Commitment to the programme

What will make it work: Clear definition of objectives and as you say a collective ‘by in’

- Connections inside, Connections outside, Good ideas

What will make low work? If we value various contributions and support each other; If we nurture emerging or non traditional ideas and methods

“Openness” is a 2-way street”

What would make it work

STRATEGYWhat will make the Research Programme work? Pragmatic approach, Clarity and confidence within team, Support and

guidance with managing links associated with openness. Willingness to extend our comfort zones

Success: Programme planning / Project Planning ‘Fail to plan, plan to fail’; Programme control and reporting; Correct resource profile Fail – lack of the above

Questions: Cohesion of goals – ralistic goals – but diversity of proejcts to cover a large cohort of activities + socio-economic groups. Consider definitions of openess/learning within OU not just IET. Identify challenges.

Success: If the shape of the programme links with the version of the senior management (Broadly defined)If the work on the project includes the sharpening of the concept of openness to motivate and drive the research.

Suceed: Fitting with priorities and agendas of funding bodies.

Work:: Synergy with other activity.

TECH

For success: Open standards (technical)

Level 3: What makes it work on external level ….That continues to be an external research agenda …External funding.

Level 2 : What will make it work• The university (outside other than IET) has this high on its agenda (I think it does• Has buyin + push from university PVCs and Deans

Learning in open worldRP work?• getting right combination of funding and people• Good partners• Clear objectives & vision

RESOURCES

Balancing caution with aspiration

Work: A motivating stretching agenda

Projects with

outcomes

Outputs

Impact

What makes it work?

Level 1 (for individual)

It is high enough on the/our personal agenda not to get pushed down by other things

So needs to map well onto other drivers

EVIDENCEWhat will make he RP work??How will we know it has worked.*If we can show influence/impact beyond IET?Beyond OU: Beyond UK HE sector?*If we change how we behve, how we see the choices & react to these?

Work: Demo of successful application of open stuff that’s cheaper (in time and money) than closed alternatives. Will draw in other researchers..

TEACHING / QUALITYHelp to increse student recruitment & retentionWhat will make it work? Good quality resources, relevance of reasons to my needs, international documentation stndards, learning materials that can bridge cultures + institutions + industries

Ideas for addin value• Need to have better representation of the

research in the institute, then deliberately look for synergies

• How to deliver? “Context Web” across IET (and wider)

• Stakeholder – New at programe level Where to develop

supportive research val?

• Measure:1 yr 3 yr 5 yrDefine Exemplers “Infra”/

Test - net sink research- supporting other

Clarify - net source research partners

• Measure development of Strand• Come up with initatives (technology related: poss to

track engagement)

• Measure engagement i.e. in cloudworks participating from OU staff + students v from others

• Measure Spread/Impact – takeup or emulating elsewhere

Refocus

Ideas for adding value

• Joint research bid around the notion of Open Design

• Adding value: efficient collaboration via tools like Cloudworks

• Put all WIP papers on the theme in a shared space• Value: Build on Open Work, make open a thing to

all our work• Good flexible dynamic representation of projects +

works• Yr 1 – activity

Yr 2 – money

Yr 3 – publications

• Use Cloudworks effectively• Collaborative network is OLNET, this is OLNET’s

future

ADDING VALUETaking things forward

Cloudworks

Building a collaborative network.

Use some of the existing OU & wider networks as research friends? SCORE, eLC, JISC projects etc.

Action Point:How is the programme going to work?What is the governance?Interdependency planning to ensure Synergy.

Solve the collaborative problem – collaborate must be a key cultural activity and sustained not flash in the pan

ADD value at level of Programme- Joint bids- Alerting each other to connections & relevant developments- Legitimation for project

OPEN DESIGN

Mapping existing projectsOULDI Cloudworks?

PI Socialearn

OLNET (Design) ( Open Ed)

EU4All (Flosscom)

?Design for openness

or

Open Design Processes

Issues for Students

& staff

+ ‘openness’ can exclude those outside OU

Open Delivery / Presentation/Learning Activity

Activity Learning Journeys PathwaysWrong term

Tension with Design History split

Depth(formality)(level)oflearning

Casualinterest

AskFriends,Google

Time/engagement/commitment

developingindependentlearning skills

developingindependentlearning skills

OU courses

PLD inSocial aspects Of ranging form display

OERs

Open evaluation

Not about evaluation of the Programme - broader

What might be Open Evaluation meaning?

Learner Experience – JISC

Learner view holistic experience of student

Challenges – analysis

representation

Being open inside + outside the OU

Building on Net Gen. research

Other voices.Formative eval.

How Open is Open

What is Open?Us open in our researchOrLearner experience in open worldFlexibility to accomody research idea + methodsHow early to rele? i?er see plagiarism

Affective Aspects

DifficultTo be open

Peer reviewQuality Research Aspects

Feel goodEmbarrassmentFree loveExposureConfidence

Open 2Who

Friends

Colleagues

StandardsQuality ChecksProfessionalism

GenerositySocial/EquitySocial Justice

ResearchOpportunity

Open entry

Funnel Modelof educat

Explicit ExpectationsManag risk reflective

BarriersTimePeer reviewLegal barriers copyrightPlagiarism + ownershipDesign oppennersHijacks ideasAccess

IP

BenefitsWide involvement / inputWildfire activityImpt Coherance – know what was all doneHigher Profile for OU

What can’t be open?InterviewsJob appsPersonal data

Pos

Neg

Narrow exam exit

What are the ethical, legal and Epistemologica / Challenges inOpen research?

WraparoundMethodological tools

Audience for open research

RQ:Open Access

Open

data

Benefits

–Tools – methodological

open

–Legal/ethical frameworks

–Depends on discipline

Further advancement of science

Clear definitionPurposeaudience

Issues of scope

Cohesion

Access / culture

or

Learning experience

Different

Levels of

• Open Research

• raw data

• practices

What impact does it haveOn resources?(time/staff expertise

Q

Impa

ct o

nR

egio

n

What is changingIn academic rules

In terms of openings?

e-science

e-social science

Collective

intel

Research Questions

• Barriers to participation in formal learning• Transition from informal, casual learning• How the resources that we have got are being

used and where• Relationship between participating in formal and

informal activities• Access to learning – audience

– Widening participation• How do people structure their learning• Confidence• Technical skills• Resources people use and how they use them• Intention for study – why do they study

RQs

• How can Open Design work - across cultures?

- internationally

• Is there such a thing as open craft?

• What is a taxonomy of open design? (agile …

• What does open design enable?

• What are the barriers/ tradeoff

What will make the programme fail?

Lack of

RESOURCES – time, people, money

ATTITUDES – lack of staff engagement, fear of openness, lack of ‘buy in’ by senior management – being over-ambitious, paying lip service to ‘open’, lack of encouragement/feedback, habit, perfectionism, distraction.

LACK OF INFRASTRUCTURE – quality, planning, connections, communication, dissemination

EXTERNAL FACTORS – Marginalisation, wider interest/funding moving on, focus on REF, others steal & do it better, funders reluctance, devalued by poor thinking

LACK OF DEFINITION – unclear goals + deliverables, about research or encouraging openness, losing initiative/direction

Make Research Programme Fail?

• Resources

• Attitudes & behaviours

• Lack of programme / project infrastructure

• External factors

• Lack of definition

CAN OF WORMS?

Openness of candid

Of Public gaffs

Improvable objects

Language of cultural values

Imbalance of researchers

Synergies

All

Funders

Foundations

EU

JISC

EXSRC

WORKSHOP FEEDBACKEVALUATION

LIKE• Interactive• Mixing with colleagues• Participation• Exposure to a wider group

within IET• Activities generated a great

number of ideas• Workshop generated a 109

ideas: Challenge is to make sense of it all

• Workshop: Liked working with IET colleagues I don’t normally work with and finding out about their work, expertise and interests.

• Good busy time• Evaluating this workshop!• Workshop – worked fine.

Do in 2 hours next time

DISLIKE

• Workshop fatigue (lots of them!)

• Lack of reference to original concepts of openness- no continuity

• Venue – noise• Free love agenda• RT@jamesaczel meeting

room fine apart from lighting, noise, temperature & lack of display screens.

• Intensive + short break would have been refreshing

EvaluationWhat worked• Group work + changing around the groups• Engagement / contribution across groups• Post its are good• Break down in groups allow further discussion• Free tea + biscuits• Brainstorming collaboration

What didn’t• Workshop too hot Too noisy• We did not get to far as to ‘actions’• Too many topics + activities – not much time for action points• Clear structure • Diversity of themes• Idea: develop theories and methodologies for articulating and

representing existing as emerging practice of learning in an open world• Measure 1 (year) research question + project

3 – 5 years methods

theories

Action points• Grainne to synthesize + feedback collaborative outputs VISIBILITY• To do: Document current “open practices” in IET• Research & publish implictions of (potensially massive) open data sets:

- for human resources• - for tools• Add value: Joint bid ideas +

- paper writing (e.g. e-science/learning/pathways

- collaborative networks + synergies with existing networks on e-social science/e-humanities

Evaluation

What worked?Lively discussion

Open atmosphere

Breadth / diversity of experiences

Good framework from Grainne

Post its good idea

Participatory

Discussion

What Didn’tDidn’t work: too many activities

Time to work together

Didn’t work: - brain / time space / planning – my!!

- a lot to do

Capturing output (maybe)

ActionAction: Develop overlap with Digital scholarship

Share Educause paper

Share: Introductory links / papers on learning – design

Develop paper on collectivité