2nd WORLD OER CONGRESS

The second World OER Congress was held in Ljubljana 18-20 September 2017,  organized by UNESCO and the Slovenian Ministry of Education, Science and Sport in close collaboration with the Commonwealth of Learning, Creative Commons, the Slovenian National Commission for UNESCO and the UNESCO Chair on Open Technologies for OER and Open Learning (Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia) with the generous support of The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

This event marked five years since the World OER Congress was held in Paris in June 2012, where the OER Paris Declaration was launched, and 15 years since the first OER was launched by MIT, and the term was coined by UNESCO.

The Congress followed the theme »OER for Inclusive and Equitable Quality Education: From Commitment to Action«, reflecting a strong focus on the role of OER in achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4.

The Slovenian Minister for Education, Science and Sports, Maja Makovec Brencic stated her opening and welcome speech "In OER the team spirit is here" With her warm and enthusiastic engagement and action oriented approach during the entire congress, there were no doubts, neither about the spirit of "Opening up Slovenia, and it was perfect align with the Slovenian slogan for the conference: OER – your endless body of knowledge

After her opening speech followed an impressive panel, where education ministers of 20 different countries discussed challenges and possible solutions fro reach the SDG€ goals for inclusive and equitable education where OER is a main driver for digital transformation and increased quality and access to education. In the end of the Congress all the Minsters delivered their Ministerial Statement, recalling the UN Framework and the articles related to human rights and accessible learning possibilities and education for all. 

OER: “Moving towards the tipping point”

In preparation for this Congress, regional OER Consulations were conducted in Asia, Europe, Middle East, N Africa, Asia, Latin America and Caribbean Pacific.

This second World Open Educational Resources (OER) Congress gathered experts and national delegates from 111 countries and the congress adopted by acclamation the 2017 Ljubljana OER Action Plan.The 2017 Ljubljana OER Action Plan presents 41 recommended actions to mainstream open-licensed resources to help all Member States to build Knowledge Societies and achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal 4 on “quality and lifelong education.”

The recommendations are promising, concrete and constructive. Five areas are covered:

1. Building the capacity of users to find, re-use, create and share OER
2. Language & Cultural issues
3. Ensuring inclusive and equitable access to quality OER
4. Developing sustainability models
5. Developing supportive policy environments

 The Action Plan concludes that: 

“Educational stakeholders should further ensure that a set of indicators, monitoring and evaluation mechanisms are in place to support these action areas.”

The accompanying Ministerial Statement signed by all the Ministers called for a “dynamic coalition to expand and consolidate commitments to actions, strategies and legislation” in OER, with a “call on all educational stakeholders to implement the recommendations of the Ljubljana OER Action Plan 2017.”

Together the two documents are really promising for the world and to the people and citizens around the globe to meet the SDG 4 on access, equity, quality and lifelong learning.

Remaining questions and actions are now if and how stakeholders will take on this responsibility, and about monitoring.

Facts about the congress

111 Member States
30 ministers
550 congress participants
140 satellite participants
21 satellites
105 countries in the Consultations
257 participants an the Consultations
44,538 website views
Honorary Patronage by EU Commissioner for Education
Honorary Patronage by President of Slovenia
UNESCO Deputy Director General
UNESCO Assistant Director General for Education
Western Balkan ministers for "Opening up the Balkans"

Our new article on Implementation of open educational resources in a nursing programme: experiences and reflections

Authors
Marie Elf, Ebba Ossiannilsson, Maria Neljesjö & Monika Jansson are the authors for this new article on Implementation of open educational resources in a nursing programme: experiences and reflections in Open Learning: The Journal of Open, Distance and eLearning (2015) Vol. 30, No. 3, 252–266.

Affiliations
Department of Nursing, Dalarna University, School of Education, Health and Social Studies, Falun, Sweden; b Center for Educational Development, SADE (the Swedish Association for Distance Education) Lund University, Lund, Sweden

Abstract

The IMPOER project (implementation of open educational resources, OER) aimed to implement OER in a nursing programme at Dalarna University, Sweden. The university and its nursing programme have long engaged in e-learning, and the nursing programme has recently been awarded the European Association of Distance Teaching Universities E-xcellence Associates Quality Label. The quality award was based on the creation of a roadmap for the continuous development of e-learning and the implementation of OER. The results of the study illustrated that overall, the students and the educators were positive about using OER. They considered that this approach was a new way of learning, and they appreciated the fact that OER were free and easy to access. However, they felt overwhelmed by the amount of material that was available and they were concerned about quality. If the use of OER is to be sustainable, a change in attitudes and practices among students and teachers is likely needed regarding the use of resources on the web. 

Keywords 

e-learning; nursing education; open educational practice; open eduactional resourses; quality education

To cite this article: Marie Elf, Ebba Ossiannilsson, Maria Neljesjö & Monika Jansson (2015) Implementation of open educational resources in a nursing programme: experiences and reflections, Open Learning: The Journal of Open, Distance and e-Learning, 30:3, 252-266
DOI: 10.1080/02680513.2015.1127140






To link to this article:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02680513.2015.1127140

ISSN: 0268-0513 (Print) 1469-9958 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/copl20

My three latest book chapters

My three latest book chapters are the following, all published Summer 2014


My first chapter: 

Once considered disruptive to learning, technology has increasingly become an integrated and valued part of the modern classroom. In particular, mobile technologies provide the ability to encourage evocative student learning through new experiences.

Promoting Active Learning through the Integration of Mobile and Ubiquitous Technologies showcases the widely varied ways that technology can be applied to enhance classroom learning. Closely examining and critiquing the best methods in assimilating technologies, this publication is a valuable resource for faculty, teachers, administrators, technology staff, directors of learning centers, and other education technology leaders interested in incorporating new technologies within the classroom for engaging student learning.

Topics Covered

• Classroom Learning
• Education Technology
• Information Technology
• Innovative Teaching Approaches
• Mobile Applications
• Mobile Technology
• Student Learning
• Virtual Learning Environments

Ossiannilsson, E. Quality Enhancement for M-learning in Higher Education (2014). In: Keengwe, J. (2015). Promoting Active Learning through the Integration of Mobile and Ubiquitous Technologies (pp. 1-304). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-6343-5

http://www.igi-global.com/book/promoting-active-learning-through-integration/105937?camid=3v11

This chapter focuses mainly on quality and a frame of reference to understand M-learning dimension concerns as course design, learning design, and media design and content. Consistent layout and design, clear organization, and presentation of information, consistency, easy-to-use navigation, and aesthetically pleasing design and graphics are dimensions that also have to be taken into consideration. It is argued in this chapter that security, accessibility, interactivity, flexibility, personalization, and the devices and interfaces are the main quality dimensions. 

My second chapter

Everyday learners use and reuse open, digital resources for learning. Reusing Open Resources offers a vision of the potential of these open, online resources to support learning. The book follows on from Reusing Online Resources: A SustainablApproach to E-learning. At that time focus was on the creation, release and reuse of digital learning resources modeled on educational materials. Since then the open release of resources and data has become mainstream, rather than specialist, changing societal expectations around resource reuse. Social and professional learning networks are now routine places for the exchange of online knowledge resources that are shared, manipulated and reused in new ways, opening opportunities for new models of business, research and learning. 

The goal of this book is to extend the debate of how open, online resources might support learning across diverse contexts. Twenty-four distinguished experts from nine countries distributed across Europe and North America contribute empirical evidence and ideas. Collectively they provide a vision of the potential of open, online resources to support learning across everyday contexts of education, work and life.

Pre-publication versions of five chapters from the book, with a special version of the editors' introduction are published in the open access Journal of Interactive Media in Education, in a special Issue dedicated to the book: 'Open for Learning Special Issue’ -http://jime.open.ac.uk/

Ponti M, Berquist M & Ossiannilsson E (2014) Learning across Sites through Learning by Design in Use In: A Littlejohn & C Pegler (eds). Reusing Open Resources Learning in Open Networks for Work, Life and Education.

The focuses of the chapter are about OER and learning by design in use.


My third chapter

Digitaliseringen i dagens samhälle är ett faktum. Vad innebär barns och ungdomars förändrade uppväxtvillkor för lärande och utbildning? Hur formas lärares roll i det samtida medielandskapet?

INTERAKTIVA MEDIER OCH LÄRANDEMILJÖER presenterar olika synvinklar på dagens utbildning, både från forskning och från praktik. Författarna tar avstamp i att lärare redan har tillgång till interaktiva medier i lärandemiljöer men att de inte alltid vet hur de ska använda dessa tillsammans med eleverna.

INTERAKTIVA MEDIER OCH LÄRANDEMILJÖER består av 13 kapitel som utifrån olika tillämpningar, erfarenheter och exempel ger lärare och pedagoger idéer, begrepp och metoder för sin professionella utveckling. De olika kapitlen ska kunna fungera som inspiration, diskussionsunderlag eller utgångspunkter för vidare problematisering, i arbetslag, utbildning eller för en enskild pedagog.

Creelman A, Ossiannilsson E & Falk P (2014) Förändringar, utmaningar, gränslöst lärande. In: E Dunkels och  S Lindgren (eds) INTERAKTIVA MEDIER OCH LÄRANDEMILJÖER. Gleerups: Malmö (In Swedish).

The chapter (In Swedish) focuses on the changing educational landscape, and the paradigm shift towards open learning. MOOCs, OERs, gamifications as well as informal and formal learning are discussed.

Practical example to reuse, revise, remix and redistribute Creative Commons resources #OCL4Ed

The task for e-tivity 4.1 at the course #OCL4Ed is to write a Blog post of 700 - 900 words based on practical example to reuse, revise, remix and redistribute Creative Commons (CC) resources plus reflection on the exercise. In this Blog post I will like to:

• Reflect on how creativity builds on  the past
• Discover how CC uses copyright law to provide permission to copy, distribute, modify and share creative works
• Study the components of the six CC licences
• Identify the three layers of a CC licence, namely the legal code, the licence deed and the machine readable code
• Study the legal compatibility among different licence types when remixing materials

For my own preparing of material, writing etc, I always look if something similar already exists. It is important to remember that Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright and enable you to modify your copyright terms to best suit your needs. The crucial is that with CC one can build forward on others work, and don´t have to reinvent the wheel oneself all the time. This was also the meaning with copyright from its very beginning, to give acknowledge to the originator/s. The great issue with CC is that the originator clearly and conciously decides her/hiselves, that allows the others as well to also decide tehmseles, and to always acknowledge the creator.

In my experiences I dons see that much unfortunatly on revising, remixing and distributions of others material. True OER users mean for example tht real OERs are just materials with CC BY and CC BY SA.  Most often however, I see materials with the so called strongest CC licence. I would have love to see more materials available with possibilities to really reuse and remix so one can bild further on on ideas etc. Then it automatically will be quality reviewed as well, with so called peer review. That’s whay I very much appreciate the project on Open Edcuational Ideas. 

As it is said in the introduction webpage of this project: ...the main purpose of licensing educational material under open licences is to allow for anyone to use, re-use or re-purpose them. However, despite a strong movement in recent years to publish such material, OER reuse is still not a common practice in Higher Education, schools and enterprises. The project intend to tackle these issues by enabling Open Education at an early stage: instead of sharing complete OER or Open Educational Practices (OEP), the aim is to share ideas in the early design process. Probably, through, this this process a fundamentally different uptake of OER can be possible by creating Emotional Ownership of OER from teh very start.

The three layers of a CC licence, namely the legal code, the licence deed and the machine readable code

The public copyright licenses incorporate a unique and innovative “three-layer” design. Each license begins as a traditional legal tool, in the kind of language and text formats that most lawyers know and love. This is  call this the Legal Code layer of each license.

But since most creators, educators, and scientists are not in fact lawyers, the licenses are available in a format that normal people can read — the Commons Deed (also known as the “human readable” version of the license). The Commons Deed is a handy reference for licensors and licensees, summarizing and expressing some of the most important terms and conditions. Think of the Commons Deed as a user-friendly interface to the Legal Code beneath, although the Deed itself is not a license, and its contents are not part of the Legal Code itself.

The final layer of the license design recognizes that software, from search engines to office productivity to music editing, plays an enormous role in the creation, copying, discovery, and distribution of works. In order to make it easy for the Web to know when a work is available under a Creative Commons license, a “machine readable” version of the license  is provided— a summary of the key freedoms and obligations written into a format  those software systems, search engines, and other kinds of technology can understand. We developed A standardized way to describe licenses that software can understand is developed and which is called CC Rights Expression Language (CC REL) to accomplish this.

Searching for open content is an important function enabled by this approach. One can use Google to search for Creative Commons content, look for pictures at Flickr, albums at Jamendo, and general media at spinxpress. The Wikimedia Commons, the multimedia repository of Wikipedia, is a core user of our licenses as well.

Taken together, these three layers of licenses ensure that the spectrum of rights isn’t just a legal concept. It’s something that the creators of works can understand, their users can understand, and even the Web itself can understand.

• Content is available under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike License.
• 

Why openness matters in education OCL4Ed June2014

The tasks for part 2 in the OCL4Ed June 2014 are about to:

• Consider why openness matters in education
• Reflect and share the reasons why we teach
• Establish and share what we consider fair and reasonable practice with regards to sharing of teaching materials
• ...and to reflect on lessons learned

To start with  talking about openness and why it matters, Iwill like to start with a citation by Lawrence Lessig...A time is marked not so much by ideas that are argued about as by ideas that are taken for granted. The character of an era hangs upon what needs no defense.
—Lawrence Lessig[1]

It is a human right for everyone to have access to education.  UNESCO considers this essential to exercising the other human rights.[2]  The use of Creative Commons (cc) is contributing to the inevitable outcome  today and in the future where open education will be taken for granted by all education institutions.Sadly, today many education institutions restrict access to learning by locking content behind all rights reserved copyright. In today's world where the cost of replicating digital information is near zero combined with the affordance that the cost of developing high quality courses collaboratively using open educational resources is far cheaper than doing this alone, we have unprecedented opportunities to promote the sustainability of education futures for all.Some argues that they are for CC, but they lock the material in a Learning Management System (LMS), and without thinking that the material is not open any longer. And, also their are  like 50 shades of openness. Some argues, including myself that real openness is with CC BY and BY SA.

Open Educational Resources (OER) and Massive Open Onlline Courses (MOOCs) have opened people's eyes to the future role of online learning in all educational sectors. CC, OERs and MOOCs is god enough by it selves, but they are also seen as catalysts for open up education, and they have given new blood, or new meaning and they has pushed a discussion of online learning on to the agendas even on top management, and mid management. It is also often argued that with increased openness, with CC, OERs and MOOCs quality will increase. When learners can use any course or material from anywhere, anytime with any device and learn from anyone both collaboration and competition will increase, and peer review, self-assessment develops. Institutions can improve their online courses, but Campus courses can also benefit  from the open movement. Incentives and strategies for open education are discussed today in new terms, very much through the hype in 2012 with the MOOCs.

So if education shall be available for everyone, everywhere at any time, with any device and from anyone, openness must be like default. Democracy, health, wellness, human rights will thus be developed and increased.

1.http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/l/lawrencele333208.html#fLKmIHc3SrTJPlJd.99

Open content licensing for educators OCL4Ed

Open content licensing for educators

The course OCL4Ed #OCL4Ed is a free online course on open content licensing for educators is  a course where we all can learn about the concepts of open educational resources, copyright and Creative Commons open licenses to achieve more sustainable education for all.

The very first task is about to reflect on our experience of  e-Learning activities on creating a blog, and to get to know each other, and to use the online course environment (see how).
Our  reflections could cover for example:

• Introduction of ourselves and reflections on what we would like to achieve by maintaining a blog to support our learning
• Reflections on the activity as such? Was it easy or hard?
• Share links to any additional resources we found useful in completing the tasks.
• Provide tips for future learners who will be completing this activity. If we were to set up a new blog again, what would we do differently?
• Add anything our readers may find interesting or useful

Hi everyone, I am Ebbba Ossiannilsson fr.o.m. Lund University in Sweden. I am very much looking forward to the OCL4Ed course. I attended this course when it first started some years agao. And now for the third time I am facilitator in the course as well as taking part to learn and to share with all of you.

I am working at national and international level on Open Educational Resources (OER);  Open Educational Practice (OEP), Creative Commons (CC), and MOOCs as well as on e-learning and especially on quality issues.
I earned my PhD 2012 from Oulu University in Finland and my Dissertation was about Benchmarking e-learning in higher education. Lessons learned from international projects 

I am a board member in several national and international Associations on elearning, MOOCs, and OERs, Associations like EFQUEL, EDEN, LANETO, EADTU, SVERD (I am V President in SVERD the Swedish Association of Distance Education). I use to serve as a quality reviewer for certification on quality in e-learning with EFQUEL (UNIQUe and ECB check).

At the latest EDEN Annual Conference 10-13 June 2014 in Zagreb, Croatia,  I was awarded the EDEN Fellow 2014.

I have done several MOOCs (some 30 in number) before.  I also use to be a facilitator in MOOCs. My main concerns are quality issues and I use to be a consultant on those issues.

I am very curious to take part in this I think  5th time  at the OCL4Ed

#OCL4Ed #EbbaOssian

Would like to share a link to the Norwefgien MOOC Investigation, from the Government on MOOCs to Norway. I will share the link because I believe it will have consequenses in the Nordic countries
http://www.regjeringen.no/nn/dep/kd/Dokument/NOU-ar/2014/NOU-2014-5.html?id=762916&WT.tsrc=epost&WT.mc_id=epostvarsel_regjeringano

Concerning writing Blogpost I do that quite frequently. I will use my current Blog for this course as well. I took part as a bloger in the Spring Blog Festival  an online course on WizIQ with Dr Nellie Dutsch.
But if I should create a  new blog, I will have done it somewaht different, maybe more structured and more ineractive.
Will see if I can do something to update this one 

Open Education Week 2014, 10th -15th March. The Swedish initiative - OERSweden

//www.openeducationweek.org/


This blogpost is to dissiminate and discuss about the Swedish initiative OERSweden


Open Educational Resources (OERs) are any type of educational materials that are in the public domain or introduced with an open license. The nature of these open materials means that anyone can legally and freely copy, use, adapt and re-share them. OERs range from textbooks to curricula, syllabi, lecture notes, assignments, tests, projects, audio, video and animation (UNESCO).


The OER movement originated from developments in open and distance learning (ODL) and in the wider context of a culture of open knowledge, open source, free sharing and peer collaboration, which emerged in the late 20th century. 

Open Educational Resources (OER) are discussed widely on a global, European and even Nordic level. The UNESCO OER Declaration shows the importance of Open Educational Resources and gives recommendations to governments and institutions around the globe. The European Union launched in autumn 2013 a large-scale initiative on Opening Up Education. These developments have been the starting point for a Nordic initiative in promoting and utilizing OER in the Nordic countries with a focus on creating a strong base for OER and Open Educational Practices (OEP) amongst the Nordic countries and in the Nordic region, also with a global outreach in mind. The Nordic countries have a potential to become a forerunner in OEP and the use of OER in Europe.

The idea of open educational resources (OER) has numerous working definitions. Often cited is the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation which defines OER as: "teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others. Open educational resources include full courses, course materials, modules, textbooks, streaming videos, tests, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge". The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) defines OER as: "digitised materials offered freely and openly for educators, students, and self-learners to use and reuse for teaching, learning, and research. OER includes learning content, software tools to develop, use, and distribute content, and implementation resources such as open licences". This is the definition cited by Wikipedia's sister project, Wikiversity. By way of comparison, the Commonwealth of Learning has adopted the widest definition of Open Educational Resources (OER) as ‘materials offered freely and openly to use and adapt for teaching, learning, development and research. The WikiEducator project suggests that OER refers to educational resources (lesson plans, quizzes, syllabi, instructional modules, simulations, etc.) that are freely available for use, reuse, adaptation, and sharing. 



During 2012/2013 a project was implemented on OER in Sweden open opportunities for learning,
the project is now called OER Sweden, funded by The Internet Infrastructure Foundation Internet Infrastructure in Sweden .SE . The project was coordinated by the University of Karlstad. Overall nine universities in Sweden attended .

 



One of the aims was to promote general awareness of the issues of OER (Open Educational Practice), open sharing cultures and practices. For participating institutions, the aim was also to develop a form of collaboration with efficient support to foster an open dialogue on the Internet. The project built further on a previous project on OER resources for learning funded by the Royal Library .

Anchoring in research / practice: OER are teaching resources over the Internet, which are freely available, to be freely used , processed and disseminated, often totally unlimited. An open digital learning resource has an indication, or copyright license, showing the conditions under which it may be used, copied, processed and disseminated. Creative Commons is currently the most common license type.

The project conducted a dozen open webinars and thirty shorter virtual networking meetings for planning and monitoring. The Webinars covered preferably about what OER is, how digital materials may be reused, but also to the digital library and metadata and standards. Two webinars were held in English with invited international guests; Open education - global challenges and OER - a question of quality. Each webinar followed a structure which subsequently was revised and refined .

The Webinars was conducted with nearly 1,200 participants. The recordings from webinars has also been seen by over 4000 people. The project website has had around 8000 visitors who came in
contact with the project through over 200 linkages from other sources.

The project's shape contributed to increasing the quality and efficiency of interaction. The project experience can be described in four areas. These are : virtual project organization, implementation
of webinars, continuous evaluation and improvement, and technical aspects .

The OER movement international and in Europe is very strong. Initiatives eg UNESCO 2012 Paris OER Declaration , OER Africa and the EU Commissionens Opening Up Education in 2013. The project and website www.OERSweden.se initiated to promote and raise awareness of OER in Sweden and OERSweden has spread well in the NordicOER project  and in the Baltic, BoldicOER
www.boldic.org . Both financed with funds from the Nordic Council of Ministers. The presentation will thus put OER in Sweden in a broader international context.

Aim of contribution
This suggestion for the Open Educational Week 2014 will focus on implementation and use of OER in small languages and cultures (like the Nordic), as most OERs are in English and within an English influenced contex

 

We also like to discuss webinars as a form for networking and democracy and for learning, contribution

Target group and focus
Everyone interested in OERs and opening up education, policy questions, implementation issues, possibilities and limitations, webinars

Language is English

Points and questions to be discussed during the  OEW
Possibilities and limitations with use and implementation of OER in small cultures and languages?
Are OERs culture and language dependent?
Adaptability of OERs?
Resusability issues?
Context dependency?
To learn from experiences from others?

Webinars as a form for networking, learning, and increased democracy

The Second Europeen eMOOC Stakeholder Summit 2014 i Lausanne 10-12 Februari 2014

 

Den andra Europeiska eMOOC Stakeholder Summit 2014, hölls den 10-12 Februari 2014 i Lausanne, som ligger vid stranden av den vackra Lac Léman, Schweiz. Värd för konferensen var École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)och P.A.U. Education. Konferensens syfte var att ge en möjlighet att samla europeiska aktörer som är inblandade i de storskaliga öppna nätkurserna, MOOCs, från beslutsfattare till praktiker till forskare. Konferensen syftade också till att utveckla synergier mellan europeiska universitet kring teman som bedömning, MOOC ackreditering, plattformar, interoperabilitet och gemensamma forskningsinitiativ. Konferensen är en uppföljning av MOOC Summit 2013.  En tredje konferens planeras 2015 i Mons , Belgien .


Konferensen hölls i den spektakulära Rolex  Learning Centre byggnaden.

 

The Rolex Learning Center byggt på Campus EPFL Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne,  med design av den internationllt  berömda japanska arkitetoniska  stilen SANAA, är ett laboratorium för lärande och ett bibliotek med över 500,000 volymer. Det är också en internationell kultursamlingsplats för EPEL och är öppen både för studenter och allmänheten. Utbredd över drygt 20 000 kvadratmeter, ger det möjlighet för  nätverkande, service, bibliotek och informationssökande, sociala utrymmen för studier och gemenskap, restauranger, kafeér och även med en fantastisk utemiljö.The Rolex Learning Center är i högsta grad och på alla sätt en innovativ byggnad med varsamma sluttningar och terasser, böljande runt en  rad av  uteplatser, med nästan osynligt stöd för sina komplexa böjda tak, för vilket krävs helt nya konstruktionsmetoder.

“The Rolex Learning Center,” Patrick Aebischer, President of EPFL, said, “exemplifies our university as a place where traditional boundaries between disciplines are broken down, where mathematicians and engineers meet with neuroscientists and microtechnicians to envision new technologies that improve lives. We invite the public into this space to convey the message that working in science is working for the advancement of society.”"

Konferensen varade i två och en halv dag. Enligt uppgift deltog 450 delegater, även med deltagare från länder utanför Europa var representerade.  Konferensen inleddes med en Master klass om vad MOOCs är och inte är, samt pedagogiska aspekter på MOOCs. I programmet annonserades hela konferensinnehållet som;

• What is a MOOC?
• How does it work?
• Why offer a MOOC?
• What is the MOOC-hype about?
• Are there downsides?
• Which players and business models are around?
• How to plan, produce and run a MOOC?

Fyra spår var genomgående under konferensdagarna:

• erfarenheter med MOOCs 
• forskning om MOOCs.  
• policy frågor och 
• affärsmodeller för MOOCs

För att få en känsla och smak av konferensens gemytliga atmosfär.och för att få djupare uppfattning om av vad som diskuterades på konferensen hänvisas till konferensens hemsida och proceedings, eller att söka i Twitterflödet på  # emoocs201. I pauserna kunde man ta del av pågående MOOC projekt och utställningar, tex som här,en interaktiv yta för samverkan


 
 


Bland key notes kan nämnas:

 

 

Xavier Prats Monné, Deputy Director-General for Education and Culture, European Commission. What is the offer for MOOC development in the new Erasmus Programme.

Simon Nelson, CEO at Futurelearn ltd. On FutureLearn.

Patrick Aebischer, President of EPFL, 20 MOOCs later- what have we learned ?

Juan Pelegrín, Principal Administrator at the "Inclusion, Skills and Youth" Unit, DG CONNECT, European Commission. H2020 Technologies and human learning. Taking learning technologies forward.

Fred Mulder, UNESCO Chair in OER at OUNL / Leader OpenupEd MOOCs initiative EADTU. MOOCs in the European OpeningUp Education Context.

Frank Buytendijk, Research VP, Information Innovation, Gartner. The Business of big data.

Carolina Jeux, CEO at Telefónica Learning Services. Telefonica visions, lessons learned in Spain and LAtin America.

Debra Humphris, Vice Provost Education. MOOCs an alternative perspective.

I samband med konferensens  öppnande argumenterade konferens ordförande Pierre Dillenbourg att vi bör inte ställa frågan "what can MOOCs do" men däremot snarare "what should MOOCs do".
 

Konferensen var mycket intressant på många sätt. Xavier Prats - Monne, biträdande generaldirektör för utbildning och kultur, Europeiska kommissionen , Belgien argumenterade för att utbildning genomgår en enastående omfattande utveckling.  Kännetecknande för denna  utveckling är att vi är i en situation där det inte finns några traditioner och att vi inte vet hur det påverkar eller kommer att påverka ( högre ) utbildning . Han noterade att man sagt så tidigare också, men den här gången ÄR det annorlunda . MOOC visar oss dessutom betydelsen och inflytandet av IKT, MIK (Media och kommunikation) och den ökade digitaliseringen, samt dess konsekvenser för utbildning. Universitetens roll kommer att förändras då kunskap numera sprids i komplexa nätverk, och universiteten förlorar sittcertifieringsmonopol. 

Andrew Ng en av grundarna, tillsammans med Daphne Koller, av Coursera  menade att  den nuvarande utbildningsmodellen är föråldrad. Att de flesta av oss tar fyra års högskoleutbildning och sedan jobbar i 40 år, oftast inom samma område, är bakåtsträvande. Vanligt idag är istället att många byter inriktning i 7 års cykler. MOOCs ger möjlighet till livslångt lärande, vilket bekräftas av det faktum att många av dem som genomför en MOOC redan har en examen. MOOCs ger  också möjlighet till innovation. Ng menade att Courseras certifikat börjar bli efterfrågade på arbetsmarknaden och att arbetsgivarna numera rekommenderar MOOC kurser.  Fler och fler berättelser om hur MOOCs förändrat människors liv och arbetsvillkor börjar också dyka upp. Ett  exempel presenterades på konferensen av Arnab Banik, Coursera, från Bangladesh. Idag styrs utbildning mer av erbjudande än av efterfrågan.  Utvecklingen och utbredningen av MOOCs innebär naturligtvis inte att högskoleutbildning dör, men däremot innebär det att affärsmodellerna för högre utbildning förändras och måste så göras. Liknande exempel vittnar musik branchen om  sedan länge, och även inom TV ses den utvecklingen, tex Netflix. 
Det talas mycket om den klart låga genomströmningen i MOOCs, siffrorna varierar från 1 % till 35 %. Men vid närmare granskning är de som registrerar sig för signatur spår / certificat upp till 90 %. MOOCs har kritiserats för brist på " personlig touch ". Detta har nu uppmärksammats av  plattformskoncernerna genom att  studiecirklar etableras och co-lokaliserade meet -ups arrangeras  runt om i världen. I samband med dessa, används också synkron bildskärm, vilket gör deltagande möjligt även för dem som av olika skäl inte kan vara fysiskt närvarande. Quizzar integreras också i ökad omfattning i videoinspelningarna. Detta utmanar den traditionella tegel och murbruk tänkande inom utbildningen och den linjärt strömlinjeformade kursmoduldesignen som idag är vanligast. Konferensen uppmärksammade också frågan om upphovsrätt. edX tex äger inget utan de har bara tillåtelse att distribuera materialet. De uppmuntrar de som publicera innehåll på deras plattform att publicera innehållet med CC-licens, men de betonar att det är leverantören som bestämmer. 

Alla de stora MOOC plattformsgivarna var så klart på plats, som Coursera , edX, FutureLearn (UK), Iversity (Tyskland) och det spanska MiríadaX. De deltog både som keynote, på paneldebatter, samt i partnermöten, vilket även var en del i programmet, med speciell tid avsatt härför. Däremellan förekom förstås även informella möten.  Tilläggas kan att Coursera även var sponsor, tillsammans med bla OpenUpEd och P.A.U. Education.


Hela den norska MOOC kommittén, MOOC Utvalget  deltog i konferensen för få "the state of the art" och att få inspiration till den slutrapport som ska lämnas in i juni 2014.Mer om MOOC utvalgets erfarenheter från konferensen kan läsas på June Breiviks blog Tanker.



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June Breivik, MOOC Utvalget och Andrew Ng, Coursera. Foto Ebba Ossiannilsson

Två talare deltog från Sverige Professor Jan - Olov Höög, dekanus för utbildning, Karolinska Institutet och Dr. Ebba Ossiannilsson, Lunds universitet. De talade båda på policy spåret.
Jan - Olov Höög medverkade under temat "joining the MOOCs conversation: partnerships, Networks and Alliances from a multi-level governance perspective. Ebba Ossiannilsson medverkade under temat accreditation policies, certification and quality assurance in MOOCs.
 
Mitt inlägg inleddes med:
"Quality is in the Eyes  of the be lover What does personalization really mean when it comes to quality"

EU kommissionens initiativ för att främja innovation och digital kompetens inom utbildningen Opening up Education utgjorde så bakgrund till inlägget nämligen  den genomgripande innebörden av att öppna upp utbildning 

... opening up means bringing the digital revolution into education. Digital technologies allow all individuals to learn, anywhere, anytime, through any device, with the support of anyone.

För att öppna upp betonas också i initiativet att högre utbildning ska/bör:

• review their organisational strategies

• exploit the potential of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)

• stimulate innovative learning practices such as blended learning

• equip teachers with high digital competences

• equip learners with digital skills

• think about how to validate and recognise learner’s achievements in online education

• make high quality Open Education Resources  (OER) visible and accessible

OpenUpEd, utvecklat av EADTU i samarbete med EU och Opening Up, och dess kvalitets features diskuterades därefter:

Öppenhet för individerna

Digital öppenhet

Individcentrerad

Självständigt lärande

Media supportat lärande

Kvalitet i fokus

Diversitet

 

Därefter diskuterades EFQUEL MOOC Quality projektet och de sju områden som behöver för beaktas för kvalitetsbedömning och kvalitetsutveckling för MOOCs:  

• Massive target group (storskalighet, obestämda  heterogena grupper)
• Mixing groups (heterogena grupper)
• Learning across contexts (lärande i olika kontexter)
• Support self-organization (självreglerat lärande)
• Declare whats in it (innehåll och struktur deklaration)
• Peer to peer pedagogy (kamrat pedagogik)
• MOOCs support choice based learning (stödjer individualiserat och självbestämt lärande)

 

Avslutningsvis i inlägget diskuterades:

"•Quality indicators and methods to describe, measure and evaluate quality for open education, OER and MOOCs

•New and innovative quality models, methodologies, standards and approaches for e-learning and open education

•Required competences by institutions as well as by learners for designing, practicing and improving open learning with high quality

•Methodologies for and experience of recognition of open learning in formal education and training

•Certification of e-learning and open education in institutions, programs and courses Integrated innovation and quality approaches

•Global aspects of high-quality Open Education"

MOOCs kan dra nytta av 30 års forskning inom distansutbildning och minst 10 års forskning om nätbaserat lärande. Några avslutande intressanta observationer från konferensen:

MOOCs för företags- och yrkesutbildning
 För närvarande har MOOCs främst utvecklats för högre utbildning och vidareutbildning. Det är dock av stort intresse även för företags-och yrkesutbildningsmarknaden. Flera initiativ utvecklar MOOCs för företagskunder (COOCs) och yrkesutbildning (VOOC) t.ex. kundutbildning. Öppna  frågor som diskuterades var: Kan MOOCs användas för att lära fysiska färdigheter , till exempel yrkes skicklighet , sport? Om företagen gör sina egna tester och träning , vad universiteten fortfarande behövs för?
 MOOC användare
Det är mestadels deltagaer från västvärlden och likasåmestadels personer som redan har en högre utbildningsnivå (master eller högre). MOOC kan ses som en form av vidareutbildning (men inte grundutbildning). Ses MOOCs i utvecklingsländer som en form av kulturell kolonialism eller en demokratisering av utbildning? Hur kan MOOCs främja nya former av pedagogik istället för att vara glorifierade video föreläsningar?Innovation
MOOCsÄr xMOOCs faktiskt olika från befintliga eLearning plattformar (förutom de större antalet användare)? [Siemens och Downes ' cMOOCs differentierade sig genom sin connectivist pedagogik , men hur xMOOCs ?] . Förslag: Gå bortom universitetet - terminen som default modell - > Trend mot kortare kurser (eftersom människor inte har mycket tid) .Konferenspresentationerna erbjöd en uppsjö av nya termer: SPOC, SOOCs och BOOCs (små och stora öppna online- kurser (Är en MOOC med färre deltagare fortfarande en MOOC), COOCs, (MOOCs för företagens utbildning), VOOCs (MOOCs för yrkesutbildning), pMOOCs ? (projektbaserade MOOCS), DOCC (öppen samarbets kurs, baserat på speciellt tema), etc. etc.listan kan göras väldigt lång.Bedömning  
Hur kan framgång mätas i MOOCs ? Ett exempel från Proversity (UK): För att förbereda arbetssökande med jobb specifika kunskaper, sökande tar en MOOC och går sedan igenom en bedömning där de har att tillämpa kunskaperna i jobbspecifika scenarier. Om de gav bra resultat, går de vidare till en online anställningsintervju processen. Peer review vs inbördes utvärdering.Certifiering / Ackreditering 
Det behövs nya former av certifiering och accreditering. Spelifiering av utbildning och utdelande av sk. märken. För närvarande krditerar få universitet eller arbetsgivare MOOCs, men vissa tillåter att komplettera med campus kurser för att få poäng. Vissa (få) arbetsgivare erkänner MOOC certifikat på CV. Trenden går mot certifiering av MOOCs av professionella organisationer (snarare än universitet).

Avhopp
xMOOC företag (som EDX och Courser ) erbjuder " premium track "-modeller , där deltagarna betalar en avgift i förväg för att få tillgång till den slutliga examen och få ett certifikat. Användare i premiumspåret har en genoförandegrad på upp till 70 % (vilket är mycket högre än vanliga MOOC deltagande). Ökningen kan förklaras med ekonomisk motivation för att få valuta för pengarna och ett urval där endast motiverade deltagare är villiga att betala.

   

Images and videos från konferensen kan ses här!

Proceedings

Avslutningsvis kan sägas att MOOCs har tänt en eld som inte så snart slocknar!