Oxford University Computing Services

Thank you to all the delegates and speakers who joined us in Oxford on Tuesday- remotely and physically. As you may know we gather here at Oxford, at about this time each year to explore and debate issues of learning technology and how it shapes learning and teaching practice.

Purpose of the event was to present and celebrate the work done this year at Oxford as part of our Open Spires project which has involved colleagues from across the collegiate institution and is part of a national programme of projects sponsored by JISC and the HEA.

Our plan for the day, as you can see from the published programme , involved a number of international speakers to set the scene for discussions about how our Openspires work places us on a global stage.

So, this being a technology conference and a very fine venue we did our best, and three of our speakers were  on video link.The day seemed to go smoothly and we have had many messages of support.

“I was particularly impressed by the professionalism, academic coherence, and superb and appropriate use of technology.  Each year I think this has to be the best so far… ( Director of IT, Oxford University)”

For those people unable to be with us, we had live tweeting and live blogging going on. We have gathered the tweets from the day  below. Recordings of key parts of the event will be made available on our website soon.

The tweets from #beyond2010 have been archived at http://bit.ly/bw9bUS

Keynote presentation from Robin Wilson, Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the Open University, a Fellow by special election of Keble College at Oxford: communicating mathematics – a historical and personal journey. Robin speaks eloquently, using slide-transparencies on an over-head projector – adding another media to the presentations on show at the Beyond 2010 conference.

Starting from an exam question ‘Describe some of the ways mathematicians have communicated their results to their colleagues’, e.g. the spoken word and the written word – with many examples, Robin covered some 4,000 years of mathematics history. Afraid this blog has suffered as I try to concentrate on the story of mathematics…

Therefore, an audio-visual taste of Robin’s 1,500+ one-off lectures about mathematics to public and other audiences is available:

• from the Gresham College website
• and presentations on ‘Lewis Carroll in Numberland: His Fantastical Mathematical Logical Life’ are available in video and in audio on iTunes-U

“It doesn’t matter what you do as long as it’s worthwhile, you do it well, and all the jobs that have to be done are done!”. Norman Gowar, Royal Holloway University of London.

Session 7 Beyond 2010.

What happens next, after Oxford’s successful first year producing OER through the OpenSpires project?

Some questions addressed:

• Re-use: Did the panel consider who was actually the audience for their content? What content did they think would ‘travel’ well? And ‘portability’ – does portability mean what stays intact in your content or how much actiuvity is generated around the re-use your content? Challenge of trying to create a course made up of over 80% pre-existing content? Re-using OERs could be made easier with greater knowledge about licencing and making content more discoverable. If you can’t find OERs through Google they’re not discoverable for most teachers.
• Sustainability? Models to explore like micro-payments? Must academia face what the music industry faced? JISC Strategic Content Alliance work to demonstrate revenue generation e.g. report: Sustainability and Revenue Models for Online Academic Resources, available as PDF. Research outcome forms should take account of the earlier delivery of media, before the publication of ‘the monograph’. “I wish I had a penny for every download!”, but why not link iTunes-U podcasts for the institutional campaign e.g. “If you have enjoyed this podcast why not donate by clicking here” – but is this a ground-shift for OED… well, it is a voluntary contribution. Sustainability – reward participation?
• Single major challenge for OER? Answers include:
  • plethora of organisations themselves so issues therefore sustainability, interoperability, platform-agnostic or even platform-allergic, might be aided by a merging at the institutional level;
  • stop talking about educational resources, i.e. talk about how to provide education in more effective ways, OER are just a means to an end so focus on the ‘end’;
  • how to change thinking (i.e. not translate the old to the new media);
  • is my department going to employ a new lecturer when they could just run the podcast series?
• Licensing: Audio podcast without pictures, video presentations without illustration, because of copyright clearance. Big step forward to get an agreement from the publishers not to charge for non-profit use i.e. non-commercial podcasts.
• OER is the tool to make the curriculum cross between US states, and between levels of study. Be aware of the impact of OER are as a movement as a driver for change, to take forward a deeper learning agenda, a very important enabler for how people can work together- in the US funding in the region of billions of dollars. Is there a big change coming in the UK? Will the younger generation even understand the questions about creating OER?

Panel:

• Dr Peter McDonald, Fellow of St Hugh’s and Tutor in English, University of Oxford
• Prof. David Robertson, – Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations , Vice Principal and Tutorial Fellow in Politics at St Hugh’s College, University of Oxford
• Marianne Talbot, Lecturer in philosophy, Department for Continuing Education, University of Oxford
• Prof. Andy Lane, OpenLearn, Open University
• Fred Mednick, TeachersWithoutBorders

Session 6 Beyond 2010.