dr Alek Tarkowski Centrum Cyfrowe Creative Commons Koalicja Otwartej Edukacji

How  to  develop  Open  Educa1onal  Resources  policies  at  na1onal  and  ins1tu1onal  level:  The  primary  and  secondary  school  sector

1. What is Open?

Digital = open

Providing a strong standard for open licensing should be a key goal of open educational policy.

What is Open?  

• The term is often used in a general sense •  Importance of strong standards of open • Free licensing as the basic standard

Open = Access to Content + Use Rights

„Open All”

• Free / Open Software • Open Access … and Open Science • Open education (HE, K-12,

preschool) • Open data: Public Sector Information,

Public Data • Open GLAM: heritage, cultural sector

content

grassroots activities and top-down policies

Grassroots activities: • We began in Poland with grassroots

activities • Advantage of personal engagement • Activists from beyond the educational

system

grassroots activities and top-down policies

O"cial policies • Policies provide strong leverage for

implementation of open standards • Public character (funding) of content

a strong argument for openness: the commons / public infrastructure

From education to open education

•  Resource policies are typically a blind spot of educational (also scienti"c, cultural) policy – not addressed by the education system •  Stakeholders do not see this as crucial

issue •  But: importance of OER model as an

enabler of change • Quality and equality of education

Education and open education

•  Looking from a broader perspective, the open education argument can be seen as just a footnote for more important debates. •  Resource policies are typically a blind

spot of educational (also scienti"c, cultural) policy •  But: the importance of OER model as an

enabler of change

Licensing debate

Providing a strong standard for open licensing should be a key goal of open educational policy.

Licensing debate

Providing a strong standard for open licensing should be a key goal of open educational policy.

Licensing debate

• Strong open licensing (free licensing) for OER and other areas, where reuse is important • Public funding – strong argument

for fully open licensing • Open Knowledge De#nition as a

underlying / uni"ying mechanism for standards negotiation • CC BY / CC BY SA / CC0

OER de#nition: Cape Town Declaration

2. Open educational resources: Second, we call on educators, authors, publishers and institutions to release their resources openly. These open educational resources should be freely shared through open licences which facilitate use, revision, translation, improvement and sharing by anyone. Resources should be published in formats that facilitate both use and editing, and that accommodate a diversity of technical platforms. Whenever possible, they should also be available in formats that are accessible to people with disabilities and people who do not yet have access to the Internet.

OER de#nition: Cape Town Declaration

3. Open education policy: Third, governments, school boards, colleges and universities should make open education a high priority. Ideally, taxpayer-funded educational resources should be open educational resources. Accreditation and adoption processes should give preference to open educational resources. Educational resource repositories should actively include and highlight open educational resources within their collections.

OER de#nition: UNESCO

a. Foster awareness and use of OER. b. Facilitate enabling environments for use of ICT. c. Reinforce development of OER strategies and policies. d. Promote understanding and use of open licensing. e. Support capacity building for the sustainable development of quality learning materials. f. Foster strategic alliances for OER. g. Encourage development and adaptation of OER in a variety of languages and cultural contexts. h. Encourage research on OER. i. Facilitate "nding, retrieving and sharing of OER. j. Encourage the open licensing of educational materials produced with public funds.

OER de#nition: UNESCO

• UNESCO „teaching, learning and research materials in any medium, digital or otherwise, that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.”

The UNESCO Paris Declaration (2012) does not provide a strong open

standard (due to the „limited restrictions” language). Still, it provides

a baseline, used as point of refence in later policy making e$orts.

http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/access-to-knowledge/open-educational-resources/what-is-the-paris-oer-declaration/

OER de#nition: Hewlett

• Hewlett Foundation „OER are 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.”

The Hewlett Foundation de#nition provides a strong standard of openness

through its de#nition of OER.

http://www.hewlett.org/programs/education/open-educational-resources

OER de#nition: FASTR (US)

•  (4) free online public access to such "nal peer-reviewed manuscripts or published versions as soon as practicable, but not later than 6 months after publication in peer-reviewed journals;

•  (5) providing research papers as described in paragraph (4) in formats and under terms that enable productive reuse, including computational analysis by state-of-the-art technologies;

The language used in the proposal for the FASTR Bill in the United States

provides a model way of distinguishing between access and reuse, and securing

both outcomes of openness.

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Fair_Access_to_Science_and_Technology_Research_Act_%28FASTR%29

Opening Up Education

•  [footnote] “OER are learning resources that are usable, adaptable to speci"c learning needs, and shareable freely”.

•  “Ensure that all educational materials supported by Erasmus+ are available to the public under open licenses and promote similar practices under EU programmes”.

Opening Up Education

•  “Bene"ciaries of Erasmus+ grants producing any such materials, documents and media in the scope of any funded project should make them available for the public, in digital form, freely accessible through the Internet under open licences” (Program guide)

The „Opening up Education” initiative and the „Erasmus Plus” program of the

European Union includes an open licensing requirement. What is missing

is a de#nition of open licensing that would set a standard of openness for

grantees.

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-13-813_en.htm

Poland  

Poland.

Poland has developed a strong, model standard of openness for educational

resources, as part of its „Cyfrowa szkoła” (Digital School) program.

http://centrumcyfrowe.pl/english/digital-school-e-textbooks-program-a-year-and-a-half-later/

Poland: grassroots

•  2008: Coalition for Open Education (KOED) • Wolne lektury repository •  Digital libraries, Open Access as related

activities •  Relatively little involvement of educators

Poland: policies  

•  2010: „Włącz Polskę” – OER for Polish schools abroad •  Grant programs by Ministries •  2012-2015: Open e-Textbooks project •  2014: Open Primer project Key themes: •  IT and education and provision of IT

equipment •  Availability of digital resources for new

curriculum

Poland: Open Textbooks

•  Part of the broader „Digital school” program

•  62 e-books on 14 subjects, 2500 other educational resources,

•  Target: use by 40% of teachers •  Modern, innovative, modular, mobile

platform (HTML5) •  Design of innovative pedagogies •  under a free license (CC-BY) •  Focus on (transforming) textbooks

OER de#nition: Poland

•  Licensing: all content will be available under the CC BY license (or comparable) – that allows use of resources and their derivatives without fees, in an unlimited, nonexclusive manner;

•  Formats: all content will be available in at least one open format – for example, web content will be available as HTML5 documents;

•  Accessibility: all content that is accessed online  will be made available in accordance with the current W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).

•  + open web platform

Poland: Policy context

•  “What is 100% funded by public money should be free and accessible”

•  Context of the ACTA debate •  Social expectations are egalitarian with

regard to education •  The importance of publishers in public

debate + overlap between education and culture (i.e. reading policy)

Poland: Public debate

„Pros” •  Educational resources shouldn’t be treated

simply as commodities •  Free access does not preclude commercial

exploitation - if true value is added •  Public intervention provides innovation in

a sti&ed, oligopolic market •  Reversed moral hazards!

Poland: Public debate

„Cons” •  Free licenses should not be an obligation. •  “Free-license” movement supports revenues

from network tra'c over revenues from creative work

•  Open textbooks will lead to destruction of Polish creative / educational industries

•  Commercial use rights are the fundamental problem

Poland: towards an OER policy

Challenges •  The access-related advantage of OER is obvious –

the (re)use potential has still not be proven •  E-textbook vs. primer

•  Textbook: a pivot for change or a ball and chain? •  Is worrying only about textbook market

shortsighted? •  How to build policies and practices that reinforce

each other? •  Who do teachers trust? Publishers

•  Business models?

OER coalitions in Europe

Elements of EU OER: repositories

Norway: NDLA

Slovakia: e-Aktovka

Belgium: KlasCement

Netherlands: Wikiwijs

Czech Republic: RVP.cz

Elements of EU OER: textbooks

Poland: e-textbooks

Slovenia: Opening Up Slovenia

France: Sesamath, Livres Ouverts

Elements of EU OER: City policies

Leicester: OER capital of The World

Leicester OER Policy  

• Permission for teachers to create and share OER • 84 schools across the city school district • Tightly alligned with digital literacy

agenda

Open policy: a template

• Legal / licensing standards • Author / publisher /

intermediary compliance • Content type • Repositories • Embargo • Metadata • Use / reuse practices (by users)

point of reference: OA

•  Advantages: •  Mature content production and distribution

model (also from an economic perspective) •  20+ years of experience w/ implementation •  Precise goals / tools / theory of change –

„modest” in a good sense •  Clear institutional policy model •  Challenges: •  (relatively) low attention paid to licensing •  Low content reuse •  Still not there!

point of reference: OA

•  Legal / licensing standards: CC BY • Author / publisher / intermediary

compliance: Green and Gold OA model •  Content type : peer reviewed journal

articles, data •  Repositories: standard, open source tools •  Embargo: 6 / 12 months • Metadata: Dublin Core •  Use / reuse practices (by users): few

point of reference: OER

•  Advantages: •  Clear arguments about importance of reuse •  Greater potential for grassroots involvement •  Challenges: •  Less mature implementation model •  Tools / standards for OER

•  Ongoing licensing debate •  More varied content makes developing a theory

of change di'cult •  Reuse: high potential / still little proof

point of reference: OER

•  Legal / licensing standards: CC BY / CC BY SA • Author / publisher / intermediary

compliance: ??? •  Content type : textbooks, ??? •  Repositories: ??? •  Embargo: none • Metadata: ??? •  Use / reuse practices (by users): many (?)

Beyond the licensing debate

Beyond the licensing debate

Beyond the licensing debate

Open  Lesson  

oerpolicy.eu  

openpolicynetwork.org  

Thank you! And please stay in touch:

@atarkowski alek@creativecommons.pl

http://oerpolicy.eu

All icons and the OER pipe graphic: Piotr Chuchla, CC BY