European OER Initiatives in the Global OER Arena Fred Mulder Chair EADTU Task Force MORIL/OER Chair ICDE Global Task Force on OER Rector Open Universiteit Nederland EADTU OER Strategy Development Seminar, K.U. Leuven, Oct , 2008

About OER … Perspective “The most promising initiative in e-learning is the concept - and the developing reality - of Open Educational Resources” --- Sir John Daniel --- former Vice-Chancellor UKOU, UNESCO, Commonwealth of Learning

OER Gobal Movement pioneered by MIT MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) Initiative (2001) All course materials freely available via the Internet for any non- commercial or research use Internal Committee (1999): “Distance education is likely to be complicated, highly competitive, and unlikely to make money” instead: “Give away all of our course materials by putting them on the Web” OCW is a Web-based publishing venture, not teaching at a distance … (Charles Vest, Former MIT President)

OER Gobal Movement carried by Hewlett Foundation and UNESCO  UNESCO (2002) defined OER as ‘digitised materials offered freely and openly for educators, students and self-learners to use and re-use for teaching, learning and research’. The UNESCO OER Community is active as ever.  The Hewlett Foundation has been instrumental by funding many OER projects, starting with MIT, and still is crucial.  We see an ever increasing number of initiatives worldwide, from HE to schools, in many fields.  The Open Courseware Consortium run by MIT shows a substantially growing membership (> > 25 affiliate)

OER … a New Wave Learner-centred instead of Teacher-centred 1/ ‘Open’ should imply much more than offering open access to a large content base. 2/ ‘Educational’ should rather be read as ‘Learning’, putting the learner in the centre instead of the formal educational system and its teachers. 3/ ‘Resources’ should go beyond the initial focus on online delivery for digital content towards web-based facilities supporting dialogue, collaboration and more in general learning communities. Adaptation of OER Definition needed …

Launch OER New Wave in 2006 OpenLearn UK Open University (UKOU) OpenER Open Universiteit Nederland (OUNL) MORIL (Multilingual Open Resources for Independent Learning) EADTU, initiated and chaired by OUNL All funded partly by:

MORIL … Consortium European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) Open Universiteit Nederland (Dutch) The Open University (English) Centre National d'Enseignement à Distance (French) FernUniversität in Hagen (German) Network per l'Universita Ovunque (Italian) Universidade Aberta (Portuguese) Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics (Russian) Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (Spanish) Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Spanish/Catalan) Anadolu University (Turkish)

MORIL … Mission  Stimulate, extend, and expand the use of OER among the Open and Distance Learning (ODL) universities in Europe  Provide lifelong learners with a new (OER-based!) gateway to Higher Education (HE)  Increase and widen participation in HE through this OER- based gateway, in line with the Lisbon agenda  Make Lifelong Open and Flexible (LOF) learning linked with new generation OER a strong Brand in Europe  Share and build on scientific and expert OER knowledge

MORIL … Goals

MORIL … Achievements [1] Awareness, commitment, embedding  Initiate and develop institutional strategies and policies  Explore the scope of the consortium  Experience ways of working, sharing, partnering  Balance between institutional interests and the associated diversity versus the collective potential  Get a good insight in the pros and cons of OER  Learn from early adopters: UK OU (OpenLearn) and OUNL (OpenER)  Extend the commitment base at the institutions through dedicated individuals

MORIL … Achievements [2] Satellite initiatives, spin-offs, and policy infusion  Institutes touching ground with their own OER Task Forces and OER course repositories  Positive look-out for further funding opportunities  Increasing number of professionals knowledgeable and devoted to OER at institutions but also in umbrella organizations like EADTU, ICDE and COL  Inflow in national bodies and governments  Range of consultations with EC bodies, programmes, stakeholders meetings, Commissioner’s Cabinet  Recognition ODL as a special branch in OCW Consortium

MORIL … Achievements [3] Widespread dissemination  Press, radio, television, blogs, etc: foregrounding members  Forums, conferences, seminars / national, European and global / R&D, policy, good practice  Specific responsibility for dissemination among EADTU members

ICDE: Global OER Task Force  ICDE = International Council for open and Distance Education / Membership includes for example: UK OU, FernUni, UOC, OUNL, and many other HE institutions around the world  ICDE has an OER Task Force, with UNESCO involved. > Kick-off Meeting Nov at UNESCO / Paris > SCOP Meeting June 2007 at OUNL / Heerlen devoted to: “OER as an instrument for achieving Education for All” > SCOP Meeting Oct at STVU / Shanghai, embracing the Final Report of the Task Force

ICDE OER TF Participants  Fred Mulder (Chair), OUNL / Chair PC SCOP 2007 & EADTU TF  Nick Allen, University of Maryland University College  Susan D'Antoni, IIEP / UNESCO  Stuart Hamilton, Open Universities Australia  Helmut Hoyer, FernUni in Hagen / Acting ICDE President < 2008  Sally Johnstone, Winona State University  Fredric M. Litto, President of ABED, Brazil / ICDE Exec. ≥ 2008  Bernard Loing, ICDE Permanent Delegate to UNESCO  Frits Pannekoek, Athabasca University / ICDE President ≥ 2008  Paulina Pannen, SEAMEO SEAMOLEC, Indonesia  Barney Pityana, UNISA / ACDE President < 2008 / ICDE Exec. ≥ 2008  Reidar Roll, Secretary General ICDE (< Spring 2007)  Tarek Shawki, Section IS and ICT in Education / UNESCO  Atwi Suparman, Universitas Terbuka, Indonesia  David Vincent, UK OU / EADTU President

ICDE OER TF Final Report: Conclusions Primary question: ‘How can OER contribute in responding to the ‘Education for all’ UNESCO policy, to capacity building and to widening participation & access?’ 2.Secondary question: ‘What role is there for OER in developing / strengthening a knowledge-based society?’ 3.Connecting ODL universities characteristics to the OER concept promises to offer a most powerful line of action in society regarding both questions (primary / secondary). 4.‘Open’ is not equal to ‘free’. 5.Keep OER away from a fundamentalist approach or a dogmatic view.

ICDE OER TF Final Report: Conclusions Diversity is crucial when considering OER opportunities regarding target groups, goals & ambitions, development state, national systems, scale & scope, content share, etc. 7.Because of this, international prioritization is difficult; should be done at institutional and at most national level. 8.‘Knowledge is a public good’ requires public funding. 9.Sustainability is not for granted and depends on a change in funding schemes. 10.It is necessary to explore the potential and added value of public-private collaborations and partnerships. Through Recommendations into Action …

Beyond current MORIL: towards valorisation Supplemental Hewlett Foundation Grant for May 2008 at UK OU: OER Strategy Implementation Seminar for European Open and Distance Learning Universities Oct at KUL: OER Strategy Development Seminar for regular universities and their associations in Europe Jan.-Feb at UNESCO, Paris: OER Capacity Building Seminar for Institutions at other continents, linking with UNESCO, ICDE, the Ibero-American AIESAD, the African ACDE, the Asian AAOU, Hewlett Foundation, & others) Launched at UNESCO 2009: MORIL-OER Portal, a central referatory portal, the gateway to the repository portals of the MORIL partners

Impressions OER Seminar Milton Keynes (May 2008) OER Strategy Implementation European Open and Distance Learning Universities

MORIL Referatory Portal  Potential users must have free and easy access on the Internet to MORIL. For this purpose both a central referatory portal will be installed at EADTU level and repository portals at the level of the partner institutions.  The main function of the central portal is to provide a clear overview of and general information about the supply of OER learning materials in various languages based on the ODL approach in the European context.  The second function is to redirect potential users to the individual institutions being the actual providers of the OER learning materials.

Priority issues (1-6) for Developed countries Priority issues (1-6) for Developing countries Awareness raising and promotion Communities and networkingCapacity development SustainabilityCommunities and networking Quality AssuranceTechnology tools Copyright and licensingLearning support services Capacity developmentResearch UNESCO Document ‘OER: the Way Forward’

#1 Priority issue for ODL Universities Sustainability (Business Model) Both UK OU and OUNL are in the process of trying to resolve their strategic dilemma of full conversion to OER as a follow-up of their initiatives OpenLearn and OpenER. --- versus --- Anadolu University in Turkey now is ‘champion’ with their decision as of 2008 to implement a comprehensive OER strategy. They expect to receive enough revenue from student fees (yet!), certification for third parties, OER development for third parties, and other spinoffs.

Epilogue … quote 1 “Our success in the knowledge economy hinges to a large extent on upgrading the quality of, and enhancing the access to, education. One of the most effective ways of achieving this would be to stimulate the development and dissemination of quality Open Access (OA) materials and Open Educational Resources (OER) through broadband Internet connectivity. This would facilitate easy and widespread access to high quality educational resources and drastically improve the teaching paradigm for all our students.”

Epilogue … quote 2 “A set of key institutions should be selected and experts representing diverse knowledge areas like agriculture, engineering, medicine, arts, humanities, science, education, etcetera should be asked to develop standards-based content, which can be customized to diverse user needs. This should be made available not only to Indian institutions but also for global use.”

Epilogue … quote 3 “The content in the repositories should be multimedia, interactive and available in different regional languages. These projects should cover a wide range of subjects mentioned above. To speed up the creation, adaptation, and utilization of OER, it is necessary to launch a ‘National E-content and Curriculum Initiative’.”

Epilogue … These are recommendations from the ’Report to the Nation 2007’ published by the National Knowledge Commission (NKC) in India, a high-level advisory body to the Prime Minister. NKC operates since October 2005 and the follow- up to their reports has shown laudable support from the government by adopting its recommendations and providing appropriate funding. The NKC Agenda places high priority on education as a central instrument for achieving rapid and inclusive growth with specific emphasis on expansion, excellence and equity. --- Does India show the way? ---

Thank you … Thanks for his input to: Kees-Jan van Dorp (Project Manager MORIL) Contact EADTU OER Strategy Development Seminar, K.U. Leuven, Oct , 2008

Confucius about Learning …