Comments on: OER Road trip

By: SportandSupplements

SportandSupplements — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:38:45 +0000

I agree with the issue of sustainability, but then again everything is based around that nowadays. However the main problem relates to the successful management thereof, which is more often than not lacking within the area of sustainability, regardless of whether one is referring to a commercial enterprise, an educational institution or whatever. Just seems that as long as people mention sustainability then things will be ok, where is the follow through? Sport and Supplements

By: ESD

ESD — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 19:18:11 +0000

Online learning is a big step, especially if you’re trying to adapt it without a data set, as it seems to be. Most learning frameworks and modules make the adaptation and learning process simple. Try something like Moodle. It has an open source frameworks, and community support.

By: brad.baker

brad.baker — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 01:59:35 +0000

Interesting read..I’m half-way trough, gonna finish some time later today, rather late here

-Alex

By: Wine of Month Club

Wine of Month Club — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 20:12:01 +0000

Thanks for the review. Interesting you left off Penn State and Harvard Extension which are some of the biggest programs in the USA. I will have a look at Maryland.

By: Shelly Television

Shelly Television — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 07:39:49 +0000

Seems like the visit was productive, but 7 years for a review of the course is a bit long (understatement)

By: Sheilamacneill

Sheilamacneill — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:18:15 +0000

Thanks for that clarification Vic

By: Vic

Vic — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:57:09 +0000

Great summary, thank you for sharing. One small correction is that Hewlett will not stop funding OER in the near future. Hewlett’s strategy within OER may be shifting, and it may be moving into new areas, but OER is and will remain part of the Education strategy moving forward for the foreseeable future.

By: Sheilamacneill

Sheilamacneill — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 15:39:06 +0000

Hi James

From our discussions this is something that the team are looking into. However, as with anything, there is a time and cost implication for creating such resources so they have to consider carefully how to make best use of their resources.

By: James Salsman

James Salsman — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 20:26:37 +0000

Why doesn’t CMU offer quizzes or any other sort of automated assessments for its free and open courses? I am continually disappointed by the shabby efforts put forth by my alma matter.

By: Sheilamacneill

Sheilamacneill — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 18:27:58 +0000

Hi Lorna

The projects we visited were certainly more involved in developing/releasing “courses” – perhaps because they have an institutional focus there is a more coherent set of resources being released.

By: Lorna

Lorna — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:20:27 +0000

Really interesting to learn more about the various different business models adopted by these US initiatives. It’s significant that all have developed some kind of course production process. It will be very interesting to see if any similar processes emerge form the JISC / Academy OER Programme.

One distinction I see between the initiatives above and the OER Programme is that the former appear to focus on courseware, which I take to mean coherent blocks of education resources with clearly defined educational objectives; whereas the latter is about opening access to a wide range of resources. I’m sure some of the OER projects will produce something akin to courseware but I think we can also expect a real mish mash of individual resources as well. Did you get the impression that any of the US initiatives had considered this more ad hoc approach at all?