Open Conference on Open Education/Practical steps, getting started

Moving straight out from the round table discussion on Open Educational Resources, this session was meant to be an opportunity for people to get hands on. It resulted in more continued discussion however, with some practical questions and answers

Links

Discussion points

Sharing experiences of finding and adopting/modifying OERs, or of building OERs - Nick Stone (Health Sciences LTU), Emma Yench (Science, Tech, Eng LTU), Ruth Jelley (Business, Eco, Law LTU).
Discussion of issues related to finding OERs - what have people tried? Where do they need guidance?
Exploration of what can be done with existing material that you want to make available openly
How can libraries help? (Simon and Roderick)
Demonstration/experimentation of uploading to library e-repository, and discussion of some pitfalls of institutional repositories (Simon, Roderick, Ruth, Leigh)

Notes

wikipedia and quality issues.
searching & provision of resources. Can use advanced search in Google to search via CC licence and resource type.
Nick - OE resource which he has created http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Indigenous_and_Intercultural_Health. "Our institution will act as custodian to indigenous knowledge." La Trobe is getting the benefit from the community of good will for free (indigenous video actors, etc). Lots of reasons to put it on wikiversity. Open. Easy to do. If improvements come with having an easy editor in wikiversity, this will help.

There is clear and strong support from the La Trobe community (staff, students) but no resources from the top down to support this or related initiatives. There is little curriculum from the Faculty of Health Sciences to support indigenous health and intercultural health, even though the faculty is one of the largest in Australia. We try to think of a global as well as Australian and local and La Trobe audience for the site. Site is pitched at 2nd year nursing and expect it to be popular as a first year elective.

Risks and challenges when creating this type of resource:

Spreading too thin to appease everyone's needs.
Getting buy-in from indigenous partners, La Trobe, government, etc.
Compared with 'standard subjects', takes a lot of time to consult the right people (communities) to create information in this resource, rather than just going it alone.

There is another staff development project on Intercultural Learning & Teaching in development. Nick is exploring other Wikimedia platforms for a community social history project, including Wikibooks and Wikigroups as well. Having this as an open project means that others will help and contribute.

Using open standards when LMS doesn't help. MP4 standard and mp3 format deliver royalties to the format owner, creating a cost that, among other things, risks the longevity of the format's use if player software no longer supports the the format (Apple). Using open standard formats through services like Archiv.org. Will convert to the open format, and satisfy archival preservation at least, and make media usable in the Wikipedia et al environments. Formats are: Ogg Vorbis for audio. Ogg Theora for video.
How can Library help us to put existing learning content into an open space - There is a form which has been developed. you can pick the CC licence applying to your object. http://arrow.latrobe.edu.au/valet/submit.cgi?view=OER We need to look at supporting searching for these items, sharing metadata elsewhere, version control (if you wish to change the licence) etc.