Living in New Zealand, due to our geography and international time zones we are very fortunate to see the future which has already happened for many parts of the world. However, in the case of the UNESCO World OER Congress, we now have the opportunity of getting back to the future of OER!
It was a memorable evening for me (New Zealand time) watching the live stream of the World OER Congress and waking up again at 3am to watch the OER university team present the closing plenary<http://wikieducator.org/OERu_share_solutions_for_Education_for_All_at_UNESCO_World_OER_Congress> at the congress from home. Belated news, but definitely worth repeating. *Following a global consultation process, The 2012 PARIS OER DECLARATION<http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/Events/Paris%20OER%20Declaration_01.pdf> has been approved by the UNESCO World OER congress. The next step in the process is to move through the formal adoption procedures by UNESCO member states. * Here is the link (save it as this is a significant milestone for OER.): http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/Events/Paris%20OER%20Declaration_01.pdf On behalf of the millions of learners which the adoption of this declaration by governments will ultimately serve -- our thanks and commendation to everyone who turned the vision of the Paris OER Declaration into reality. The OER Foundation, WikiEducator community and the OERu anchor partners are well positioned to assist countries and education institutions around the world with the implementation of the principles contained in the declaration. Examples are provided below. Viva OER, Viva! Wayne *Examples of how the OER Foundation family will support the 2012 Paris OER Declaration* *a. Foster awareness and use of OER.* * * Our OER Foundation family is committed to assisting educators and education institutions with the mainstream adoption of OER at all levels and all educational sectors. Its our core mission. *b. Facilitate enabling environments for use of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT).* * * The technical infrastructure of the OER Foundation is based entirely on free and open source software and therefore easy to replicate in facilitating enabling environments for anyone who prefers co-operative strategies for OER implementation. Through WikiEducator we are increasing the range of OER support resources to improve media and information literacy for all educators worldwide. Jim Taylor, one of the thought-leaders in our OER university community, highlights that "*The OERu will place students at the centre of the educational process in such a way that they will develop learning and digital literacies as a solid foundation for meaningful participation across international boundaries in a networked world" *(see media release<http://wikieducator.org/OERu_share_solutions_for_Education_for_All_at_UNESCO_World_OER_Congress> .) *c. Reinforce the development of strategies and policies on OER* * * All policy documents developed through OER Foundation initiatives are developed transparently and published under open licenses in editable file formats. These policies are available for reuse and modification by anyone who wishes to refine and implement their own open policies. *d. Promote the understanding and use of open licensing frameworks.* This is a feature activity of the OER Foundation. Our Open Content Licensing for Educators<http://wikieducator.org/Open_content_licensing_for_educators/Home> online workshops have already provided free training opportunities in open licensing for approximately 2000 educators from over 90 different countries. With acknowledgement of initial funding support from the UNESCO Office for the Pacific States to develop these OER course materials, the delivery model has been designed to scale for thousands of learners. We will continue to offer these free training opportunities. *f. Support capacity building for the sustainable development of quality learning materials* The OER Foundation hosts the Learning4Content initiative which is the world's largest attempt to build wiki skills for collaborative development of OER. We have offered free training opportunities to over 5000 educators from over 150 countries. We acknowledge initial funding support from the William and Flora Hewlett foundation, the Commonwealth of Learning and New Zealand Ministry of Education in supporting these efforts. The newly founded WikiEducator Open Learning Academy will continue this groundbreaking work as a community volunteer initiative. The OERu network and the Commonwealth of Learning Chair in OER at Otago Polytechnic is aiming to integrate existing training courses and to develop new training courses in OER which will provide opportunities for formal academic credit towards recognised credentials. f. Foster strategic alliances for OER The OER university network <http://wikieducator.org/OERu> of anchor partners is a prime example of an international strategic alliance for OER. This is the first international innovation partnership that will be able to accredit OER learning in Africa, Asia, North America and Oceania. *g. Encourage research on OER* * * The OER Foundation community and its flagship projects provide an excellent international platform for research in OER. All research data produced by the OER Foundation projects are released under open licenses to support reuse and ongoing research for all in the academic who are interested. -- Wayne Mackintosh <http://wikieducator.org/User:Mackiwg>, Ph.D. Director OER Foundation <http://www.oerfoundation.org> Director, International Centre for Open Education, Otago Polytechnic Commonwealth of Learning Chair in OER, Otago Polytechnic Founder and elected Community Council Member, WikiEducator<http://www.wikieducator.org> Mobile +64 21 2436 380 Skype: WGMNZ1 Twitter <http://twitter.com/#%21/Mackiwg> | identi.ca<http://identi.ca/waynemackintosh> Wikiblog <http://wikieducator.org/User:Mackiwg/Blog> -- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "WikiEducator" group. To visit wikieducator: http://www.wikieducator.org To visit the discussion forum: http://groups.google.com/group/wikieducator To post to this group, send email to wikieducator@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to wikieducator+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com
