Open Education. A Modern Approach to Teaching and Learning

Richard Baraniuk Rice University

Houston, Texas, USA

Open Education

A Modern Approach to Teaching and Learning

vibrantinteractivecommunityconnectedinnovativeup-to-dateefficienteffective

vibrantinteractivecommunityconnectedinnovativeup-to-dateefficienteffective

create

share

usefreely

re-useopenly

create

share

usefreely

re-useopenly

vibrantinteractivecommunityconnectedinnovativeup-to-dateefficienteffective

create

share

usefreely

re-useopenly

vibrantinteractivecommunityconnectedinnovativeup-to-dateefficienteffective

create share

use re-usefreely openly

why?

today’s textbooks/courses lock up educational ideas – closed formats– closed copyrights

create

share

usefreely

re-useopenly

vibrantinteractivecommunityconnectedinnovativeup-to-dateefficienteffective

open education

today’s textbook pipeline

authoring

editing

quality control

publishing

distribution

open education ecosystem

authoring

editing

quality control

publishing

distribution

feedbackpeersuserslearning

OEenablers

enabler 1: technology

Web/XML

common framework for sharing

Internet

virtually free distribution

virtually infinite, permanent storage

ecosystem – primordial state

textbook / course

enabler 2: new IP

intellectual propertyand copyright

make content safe to share

common legal vocabulary

inspiration: open-source software (Linux)

create

re-useopenly

usefreely

OERshare

OEexamples

Connexions (cnx.org)

Usage per month:1 million unique users45 million hitsfrom 190 countries

founded 9½ years agonon-profit open education platform

500 open textbooks/courses10,000 Lego modules

from contributors worldwide in many languages

free on-linelow-cost in print

Community College Open Textbook Project80+ CC’s in USA and Canada

developing a suite of free open textbooks

Government of Vietnamdeveloping new curriculum at 40 universities

Siyavula / Shuttleworth Foundationcomplete K-12 curriculum for South Africa

IEEEeducational outreach in electrical engineering

some Connexions partners

translation

shutouts

Catherine Schmidt-Jones

private music teacher, USA

music theory textbooks12 million uses to date

Sunil Kumar Singh engineer and parent, India

physics textbook2 million uses to date

open education opportunities

open accessfree on-linelow-cost in printnever out-of-print high-qualitycontinuously updatedtranslateddemocratic

OEthe road ahead

interactivity

see

do

open education

open science

open education

capetowndeclaration.org

open science

Q: is OE financially sustainable?

sustainability

Q: is OE financially sustainable?

Q: is the status quo sustainable?

textbook prices have risen 4x faster than inflation for well over a decade

publishers are pricing themselves out of the market

sustainability

software

textbooks

music

Q: is OE financially sustainable?

A: OE (can be) compatible with for-profit publishing

enables commercial entities to add value to OERs andsustain the community

sustainability

recommendations

recommendations

OER mandate– public access to publicly funded education– stop buying and start developing– open up current and future government-sponsored

educational materials

adopt truly open intellectual property– not all open licenses are as “open”– CC-By and Public Domain licenses are open to

both public and private industry

learn from others’ successes and failures– Netherlands, Vietnam, Brazil, USA + several States

Richard Baraniukrichb@cnx.org

Joel Thiersteinjt2@rice.edu