SCOP 2007 ‘Open Educational Resources as an Instrument for achieving Education for All’

Towards European-wide Quality and Benchmarking of Open Educational Resources

Kees-Jan van Dorp & George Ubachs

European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU)

Kees-Jan.vanDorp@EADTU.nlGeorge.Ubachs@EADTU.nl

Agenda

Part – One: Consortium of New Generation OER

Consortium introduction Consortium stages Consortium progress Consortium outlook

Part – Two: Proliferating Quality and Benchmarking

The problem at hand Some results Tool support needed E-xcellence

Consortium introduction

Consortium philosophy

A new generation open educational resources Stimulate, extend, and expand the use of OER in Europe Provide lifelong learning with a new gateway to university education Widen the participation in higher education in line with the Lisbon agenda Brand lifelong open and flexible learning throughout Europe Share and build on scientific and expert knowledge of OER

Consortium aspiration

A new generation open educational resources No traditional face-to-face educationDidactic model based on distance education Specifically designed, developed for distance learning Courses with intrinsic broad pedagogical coverage Unique pathway: from non-matriculated to matriculated Successive multilingual versioning and localisation Content and registration: a distributed model Content mobility and virtual mobility Strong partnership

Consortium introduction

Consortium “tangibles”

Members providing a broad offer of open courses Universities increasingly into mode of informal learning Interconnectivity between formal and informal learning (bridging two modes of learning)

Transfer of courses between member institutions (translation and localisation)

Overarching portal pointing to national OER portals Best practice and progress support for the partners (variety of attitude, commitment, and growth path)

Policy-making: institutionally, nationally, and European

InformalInformal

Utilise open resources Utilise open resources

Enter formal programmeEnter formal programme

N

N

Y

N

Y

N

Y

Y

Off-campuslearning

Academic appetite

Learning privileges

Consortium extends “Open” invitation to learn

Consortium introduction

• European Association of Distance Teaching Universities

• The Open University (English)

• Open Universiteit Nederland (Dutch)

• FernUniversität in Hagen (German)

• Centre National d'Enseignement à Distance (French)

• Network per l'Universita Ovunque (Italian)

• Universidade Aberta (Portuguese)

• Moscow State University of Economics, S and I (Russian)

• Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (Spanish)

• Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Spanish/Catalan)

• Anadolu university (Turkish)

Task forceTask force

Core group Core group

Actors Actors Actors Actors Actors Actors Actors Actors University(high-end)

Local TFLocal TF

Research expert

Governance structure Consortium “composition”

Consortium stages

How did we as a Consortium start?

One year ago………just born, small, fragile ………

………analogous to ………???☺

1. Conception phase

2. Embryonic phase

3. Infant phase

4. Maturation phase

5. Adult phase

Fragileentity

Robustentity

learning and experiencing

- - An analogy -

Where do WE stand?(have we matured yet)

risks

Consortium stages

Potential factors influencing Consortium maturing

Organisation-relatedOrganisation-related

Characteristics of organisations’ strategies, structure and funding methods Changing organisational needs and perceptions Current ICT infrastructure context Maturity of new technologies available Commitment and support within different echelons Staffing, experts and project experience

Content-relatedContent-related

Availability, size and complexity (rework) Technical and definitional issues (exchange strategies) Intellectual property rights (third party rights) Availability of pacing and learning schedules (learner support) Content “shelf-life” and annual releases (renewal) Quality assurance systems

Process-relatedProcess-related

Project costs and funding Planning and time-span Governance structure Project management Project team expertise Project staffing stability

Operations

Consortium progress

Core group meetings - ‘Core Group Meeting’ (June 30, 2006) at The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes- ‘Core Group Meeting’ (August 25, 2006) at FernUniversität Hagen, Germany - ‘Core Group Meeting’ (November 9, 2006) at European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU)- ‘Core Group Meeting’ (December 20, 2006) at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Belgium ‘Core Group Meeting’ (February 2, 2007) at at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Belgium

Task Force meetings ‘Task force’ Meeting (February 22, 2006) at EHSAL, Brussels ‘Task force’ Meeting (September 13, 2006) at EHSAL, Brussels ‘Task force’ Meeting (January 15, 2007) at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Belgium ‘Task force’ Meeting (May 14, 2007) at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Belgium

EC Consultations DG Information Society and Media, eContentPlus Workprogramme 2006,Consultation meeting, Luxembourg, 6 April 2005Preparatory stakeholder meeting Directorate General Education and Culture (DGEAC)preceding the meeting to the Cabinet of Mr. Ján FIGEL', Brussels, 3 March 2006 Stakeholder meeting EADTU and William and Flora Hewlett Foundation to the Cabinet of Mr. Ján FIGEL', Brussels, 14 March 2006 DG Information Society and Media, eContentPlus Workprogramme 2008Meeting of education stakeholders, Luxembourg, 27 April 2007Stakeholder meeting EADTU to Principle Administrator DG Information Society and Media

on eContentPlus Workprogramme, Luxembourg, 3 April 2007 Stakeholder meeting EADTU to the Cabinet of Mr. Ján FIGEL', Brussels, 23 May 2007

Strategy &

policy

Politics

Consortium progress

Achievements: awareness, commitment, embedding

Building a consortium model Ways of working, sharing, partneringIndividual partners, collective strength Addressing benefits of OER Initial framework for adoption

The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation has been a true process catalyst for mobilising individual partners and to provide for dissemination, sparring and support

Achievements: wide-spread dissemination

Press, Blogs, etc: foregrounding membersForums, conferences, national and European Frontrunner dissemination by EADTU membersPropagating OER in Conferences:

Achievements: satellite initiatives and spin-offs

Institutes touching ground with ‘local’ OER Task Forces Increased look-out for funding opportunitiesInstallation and appointment of OER professionals (EADTU, ICDE, UNESCO, etc.)Inflow in national bodies & international consortiaHigh-end consultations with Commission’s Cabinet ODL into OCW Consortium recognition

Online Educa Berlin 2006(UK OU, UOC, EADTU)

EU e-Learning Conference Helsinki 2006(UK OU, Miskolc NHRDC, OUNL, EADTU)

EADTU Annual Conference Tallinn 2006(UK OU, FernUni, UNED, e-Collegium, NHRDC,UniNettuno, UOC, EADTU)

Open Education Conference Utah 2006(UK OU,OUNL, EADTU)

EduMedia Conference Salzburg 2007 (EADTU, OUNL)

SCOP Conference Heerlen 2007(EADTU, OUUK, OUNL)

“planning to create at least 10 multilingual courses10 multilingual courses”

Consortium progress

Member commitment….now taking off

“co - production system to realisecourses in a multilingualmultilingual format”

“generate no less than twelve 1 ECTS courses”

“translate French online courses in GermanGerman, , SpanishSpanish and and EnglishEnglish”

“allall OER courses already developed will be made available”

“make available one or two courses

for MORIL activities”

“planning to adopt and to localize

in Russian at least 20 coursesat least 20 courses”

extending beyond Europebeyond Europe to Latin America

and the United States

“number of courses in the portal will increase

progressivelyprogressively within time”

….I guess we are on the right track!

Consortium outlook

Agreement on project Master plan Consolidation of critical course mass Diversification of funding sources Assuring availability & stability of staff

Robustentity

learning and experiencing

““Consortium building” Consortium building” Here do WE standHere do WE stand

Project Project Roll-outRoll-out

Consortium outlook

Aren’t we forgetting something?

Long term Consortium success depends on the learners’ appreciation

Individual quality perceptions and personal course satisfaction

The key to retention of your visitors and learners

myQuality

Proliferating Quality and Benchmarking

The problem at hand

Autonomous, self-study courses?

Many OERS, much variation: what is myCourse, what is myQuality, where is myPedagogy?

In search of: Bioinformatics “some sort of an introduction”

(actually searching: Bioinformatics, a quick reference for dummies, pedagogically-rich, visual learning elements, a fast forward course)

How do I select? My Search and Learning time to be devoted, is limited

Many results, but unfortunately disappointing:

OER Blogs, Lecture notes (classroom based), Hyperlinks (not working), Literature references (buy textbook)…..But no coherent course!

Finally, I found one coherent course!But no Quality Metadata

Coherent course, self-studywhat is fit for myPurpose

where is myPedagogysearching for myQuality

Some results ofmy humble exercise

Bio

info

rmat

ics

“so

me

sort

of

an i

ntr

od

uct

ion

”

OER urgently requires tangible and ready-to-deploy OER urgently requires tangible and ready-to-deploy quality instrumentsquality instruments

built upon a European (or Global) platformbuilt upon a European (or Global) platform with national recognitionwith national recognition

Tool support needed

E-xcellence

QA in HE and is receiving a lot of attention at institutional, national and European level

Still missing: QA specific to e-learning

• Criteria based on ease of access

• New forms of interaction (students and staff)

• Flexibility, personalisation and other pedagogical aspects that are more relevant to

e- learning

• They express the added value of e-learning to HE

Especially, with the leap towards new generation OER

E-xcellence

E-xcellence in e-learning is:

• Complementary to other national quality assurance systems

related more to content, staff and infrastructure

• Optimising the learning process and offering assurance to stakeholders

that e-learning provision is of high quality

E-xcellence has established:

• A framework of quality criteria for the development, operation and evaluation of

e-learning programmes

• An appropriate set of performance indicators, parameters and guidelines by

which the quality of e-learning programmes can be measured by assessment

• A definition of threshold and excellence level

E-xcellence

Set of (33) European benchmarks

They cover institutional, pedagogical, technical, ethical and management aspects of e-learning organised into the three main categories of :

• Management(institutional and programme levels)

• Products(curriculum, course design and delivery)

• Services(student and staff support)

An important aspect of E-xcellence is that it offers a European-wide

set of benchmarks, independent of particular institutional or national

systems, and with guidance to educational improvement

E-xcellence

E-xcellence

E-xcellence

Cutting-edge developments

European OER Consortium European Quality Consortium

European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU)

Open Universiteit Nederland (OUNL)

The Open University (UKOU)

FernUniversität in Hagen

Network per l'Universita Ovunque (Nettuno/UniNettuno)

Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED)

Centre National d'Enseignement à Distance (CNED)

Anadolu University

Universidade Aberta

Moscow State University (MESI)

Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC)

European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU)

the Open University (OUUK)

Open Universiteit Nederland (OUNL)

University of Oulu (OULU)

Centre National d'Enseignement à Distance (CNED)

Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC)

Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED)

Estonian Information Technology Foundation (EITSA)

National Council for Distance Education (APERTUS)

Network per l'Universita Ovunque (NETTUNO)

European University Association (EUA)

The eLearning Industry Group (eLIG)

Nederlands-Vlaamse Accreditatie Organisatie (NVAO)

Join in

E-xcellence

SCOP 2007 ‘Open Educational Resources as an Instrument for achieving Education for All’

Towards European-wide Quality and Benchmarking of Open Educational Resources

Kees-Jan van Dorp & George Ubachs

Kees-Jan.vanDorp@EADTU.nlGeorge.Ubachs@EADTU.nl

Thank you !