I’m a librarian by training but my professional experience is mostly in repository and e-learning related stuff. As a result I’m fascinated by the intersection of the e-learning, repository, and library communities, particularly when it comes to managing learning materials as the three groups often have different perspectives on how to describe and manage stuff. [I’ll note this is more a personal viewpoint that one that directly relates to CETIS’s support for UKOER]
In the context of Open Educational Resources there are the beginnings of some consideration of how OER initiatives and libraries/ librarians might relate. There are some clear patterns but, in a somewhat similar way to the beginnings of the Open Access movement, there is a need to consider how OER initiatives scale and they integrate or relate to institutions (or not). I think libraries have an important part to play though one quite different than their role in the Open Access movement, but that’s a thought to come back to in detail another time (in a nutshell – I think OERs require a much more distributed and collaborative process).
There have been some interesting offhand comments about the role of libraries cropping up in the context the UKOER programme and more widely the question surfaces every so often.
For example:
- Another 1/4-baked idea – OER “virtual reference librarian http://www.edtechpost.ca/wordpress/2010/01/06/oer-virtual-reference-librarian/
- Postslides of OER libraries and the future http://www.slideshare.net/coarsesalt/postslides-of-oer-libraries-and-the-future
- Open Educational Resources and the University Library Website (see also the follow up posts in comments) http://ouseful.wordpress.com/2009/08/10/open-educational-resources-and-the-university-library-website/
This is an area I hope to do some more work in and recently I ‘pitched’ for an opportunity to carry out some research in this area. I was ultimately unsuccessful but I think my presentation captures some of the potential opportunities for libraries. The short version is:
It has been suggested that Libraries and librarians can:
- Create and use their own OERs
- Identify and index quality OERs […let’s not start talking about ‘quality’ learning resources please…]
- Preserve OERs
- Help with IPR
These are all good ideas but I’d like to suggest is that libraries might also:
- have an interest in promoting ‘openess’/ open resources
- help users describe OERs
- help users discover OERs
- help manage OERs
- help users disseminate OERs
- evolve their approach to information literacy and study skills to include OERs
- supporting the use of OERs for learning and teaching in collaboration with other relevant services
The full presentation is over on slideshare http://www.slideshare.net/RJohnRobertson/oers-and-libraries and I’m hoping to get a chance to write this up a bit more soon.