OCW Consortium Newsletter_September 2011 by OpenCourseWare Consortium

OpenCourseWare Consortium

Newsletter September 2011

Welcome to the September 2011 issue of the OCW Consortium newsletter, focusing on localizing OCW materials. This issue features a refresher on Creative Commons licenses, interviews with those involved in localizing OCW, reports from OCW-related events worldwide, and some important reminders. We welcome your comments and feedback to newsletter@ocwconsortium.org

Focus on: Localizing OCW materials Localization of OpenCourseWare â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Case Studies and Interviews Translation of OCWs: Making OCW materials available in various languages has tremendous potential for reaching formal and informal learners alike who could not otherwise benefit from such rich resources. Furthermore, translating OCW from another university can evolve into publishing oneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own OCW materials. The following interviews provide an interesting comparison between a translation project run entirely by volunteers and one that has received institutional support. These OCW translation initiatives below demonstrate the demand for such material, as evidenced through the number of visits that translated OCWs get on a monthly basis. UNIVERSIA UNIVERSIA is a Consortium of universities from Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries. With a membership base of more than 1000 universities and institutions of higher learning worldwide, it represents more than 10 million enrolled students. During the years 20082010 UNIVERSIA translated 143 courses from MIT OCW, with numbers of visits shown in the adjacent table. For more information, please email Marta del Pino at marta.delpino@universia.net Source: Web Traffic Statistics: January-August 2011, UNIVERSIA

Inside this Issue: 1 9 11 12 13

Localization of OpenCourseWare - Case Studies and Interviews Licensing OpenCourseWare OER Conference Around the World Community Updates Consortium News and Updates

African Virtual University The African Virtual University (AVU) operates in three African language groups: Anglophone, Lusophone and Francophone. With support from the African Development Bank, AVU developed 73 modules with academics from three regions in Africa. Declan Ottaro of AVU reports that “out of the original 73 modules, 61 were done originally in English and 12 in French. These were then translated to the other 2 languages to make a total of 219. We felt that it was essential that all benefit from the content.” When AVU launched its OER interactive portal, AVU@OER (http://oer.avu.org/), in December 2010, all 219 modules were licensed under CC-BY-SA licenses. The portal contains courses in mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, professional teacher education, and ICT in education. Duplicate modules have been also made available on Scribd (www.scribd.com/), a social publishing site for sharing documents and original writings.

Source: 1. DSpace Internal Statistics - OER@AVU (December 2010-August 2011); 2. Scribd

In the period December 2010 – August 2011, AVU’s courses were cumulatively visited by 298,442 people, with average monthly visits of 15,163 on the AVU@OER portal and 17,997 on the Scribd portal. As Declan Ottaro tells us, “we decided to make the modules available on Scribd as well in order to reach as many people as possible. We recognized the inherent risk of drawing traffic away from our Portal, but the

According to Bakary Diallo, Rector of AVU, the high number of visits to the Portuguese materials comes from visitors in Brazil, showing the demand reaches far beyond the African continent.

Stats – Scribd (December 2010-August 2011).

desire of having as many people impacted as possible was an overriding factor.” Furthermore, more than 50% of all the visitors were accessing AVU’s modules in English, followed by more than 30% in Portuguese and circa 15 % in French (Source: Google Analytics).

For more information, visit http://oer.avu.org/ or write to tech@avu.org.

Among other interesting initiatives for translating OERs is the Sookmyung Network for an Open World (SNOW) in South Korea, an OER project run by Sookmyung Women’s University, which translates OERs/OCWs into Korean. Their translated content gets thousands of visitors every month. You can learn more about the project here (http://www.slideshare.net/sno workr/to-introduce-yumi-kim; http://www.snow.or.kr/common /aboutus_en.html) or email info@snow.or.kr. If your institution or organization is involved in translating OERs/OCWs into various languages, we would like to hear from you. newsletter@ocwconsortium.org or feedback@ocwconsortium.org

1 2

Interview with Lucifer Chu Lucifer (or Luc) Chu is the founder of the Foundation of Fantasy Culture and Arts (established in 2001) and of the Opensource Opencourseware Prototype System (OOPS, established in 2004), a volunteer-based translation group making Traditional Chinese translations of OCW and OER. Currently, OOPS’ operations are sustained with the help of nearly 3000 volunteers. In an interview with Igor Lesko of the OCW Consortium, Luc provides an insight into how OOPS started and talks about the processes, benefits and challenges associated with translations of OERs into Traditional Chinese.

IL = Igor Lesko LC = Luc Chu IL: How did OOPS start, and what was your motivation for starting with translations of OCW into Traditional Chinese? LC: I like to share knowledge, but the language barrier is always preventing people from enjoying the good will of many great institutions. That’s why OOPS started a Chinese translation project aiming for OERs. IL: How many translated courses do you currently have on your website, and where do the original sources primarily come from? LC: We have over 1,600 courses. Most of them came from MIT, JHSPH or Yale. Recently we added a lot from TED. IL: How do you decide which courses to translate? LC: Volunteers decide. IL: How do you handle licensing issues? LC: If it's not CC licensed, we don't do it. We don't have the manpower to negotiate the rights with owners.

by swanky Luc Chu was the official translator of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy into Chinese, and he translated several Star Wars novels as well. He donates most of the royalties gained through the translations into the Foundation for its operations

IL: Certain CC licenses can be harder for localization efforts, for example, NonDerivative (ND) or NonCommercial (NC). How have you handled this? LC: Well, this is one of the main difficulties we have faced for the last several years. Let's talk about the ND first. Generally, if you push ND to the extreme, it can mean no subtitle translation for videos, because than can be seen as a kind of derivative. But most of the time, through some emails or talks, translation can be seen as in the grey zone, so from my experience, ND still works if you want to translate them.

The problem for ND is that it limits the impact. It's like farmers growing really good crops, but only allowing people to eat them raw.....I think even ND materials should still allow a shorter version. And NC, I don't even bother to ask. Most of the time it will be turned down by the owner. They are always afraid of your making millions out of it. In fact, people who ignore the license altogether may have a chance, but we don't. I think NC should have a sustainable sub-rule, which opens a back door for sustainability. IL: How long, on average, does it take to complete a translation of a full course (from the time of starting with the translation until it is published on your website)? LC: Usually 2 or 3 months. It depends on the quantity of course material. Sometimes it has taken more than a year. IL: In your view, what have been some of the main benefits of the OOPS initiative thus far to: - Users of the translated OCW content? LC: More efficient use of OERs. -Individuals involved in translating the materials?

LC: They learn by themselves in the process. - Yourself? LC: I have read almost everything...Thus I have learned the most. IL: How many individuals are involved in carrying out translations at OOPS? LC: More than 2700 volunteers. IL: Do you have any control mechanisms in place to ensure that the translated content is accurate? LC: Volunteer editors and fulltime editors and users help us to screen the results. IL: What have been some of the key challenges thus far? LC: Money: our key staff still needs to get paid. IL: The issue of sustainability, sooner or later, is inevitable. How does OOPS deal with sustainability? LC: Small donations and grants. It is still very difficult to attain sustainability. IL: Based on your experience at OOPS, what would be your advice to people who would like to start with translations of OCW into various languages? What factors do they need to consider? LC: Just do it, and think and fix and evolve later, or it will take forever just for you to start the project. To contact Luc with more questions, please email Lucifer.chu@gmail.com or visit http://www.myoops.org

Statistics on OOPS

Source: Web Traffic Statistics: January-August 2011, OOPS

In the period between JanuaryAugust 2011, OOPS got, on average, 261,860 visitors each month. In terms of origins of visitors, Taiwan ranks at the top, followed by mainland China, the United States, Hong Kong and Japan. OOPS also receives a large number of visits each month from countries such as the Netherlands, Germany, the Great Britain, Australia, Canada, India and more. For more information about OOPS and the users who access its translated courses, read “Who Are Using Open Courseware and How Do They Use It? An Exploratory Study From a Chinese-Based Open Courseware Portal in Taiwan (OOPS).” The article can be accessed at: http://www.ocwconsortium.org/en/co mmunity/documents/doc_download/ 726-2011oopsreporthuangshen

To learn more about OOPS’ community of translators and its practices, read “OOPS, Turning MIT Opencourseware into Chinese: An analysis of a community of practice of global translators,” full text at http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/ir rodl/article/view/463/980

by swanky

Interview with Prof. Mahinnaz Mirdehghan Prof. Mahinnaz Mirdehghan is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics & Senior SBU-MIT OCW Program Manager at Shahid Beheshti University (SBU), Tehran, Iran. As an official MIT Translation Affiliate, SBU translated 64 MIT OCWs into Persian between 2006-2009. Prof. Mirdehghan talks to Igor Lesko of the OCW Consortium about the translation initiative at SBU and explains how it evolved into SBU’s starting to publish its own OCWs.

MM = Mahinnaz Mirdehghan IL=Igor Lesko IL: Can you say a few words about how the translation project at SBU started? What was SBU’s motivation for starting with translations of MIT OCW? MM: Shahid Beheshti University (SBU; formerly National University of Iran), joined Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a Translation Affiliate for its OpenCourseWare program (OCW). The pilot project was established between SBU (Tehran-Iran) and MIT OCW (USA) in 2006, in regard to Persian (Farsi) translation of a set of selected courses from MIT OCW. This joint project has mainly committed to advancing education via the philosophy of OCW and knowledge open to everyone. The primary mission of the project has been to translate MIT OCW’s selected course materials into Persian and to familiarize our faculty with blended learning procedures, which facilitate online educational strategies in achieving a respectable educational outcome.

Prof. Mahinnaz Mirdehghan

The vision of the project has been to serve as a first step for the advancement of OCW in Iran, in relation to which the OpenCourseWare Consortium of Iranian Universities (IR OCW) is being organized, to speed up the use of countrywide, interoperable learning materials. In this project, which up to now has been performed in two phases, SBU has launched a site (http://mitocw.sbu.ac.ir) containing Persianlanguage translations of the 64 MIT OpenCourseWare courses. Following the philosophy of Open and Free Sharing of Knowledge demonstrated by MIT OCW, SBU OpenCourseWare is open and available to the world. IL: How did you decide which courses to translate?

In its first pilot phase, the project website (http://mit-ocw.sbu.ac.ir) was launched and posted the Farsi translations of the teaching materials of 29 MIT courses and shared them with knowledgeseekers and educators from around the globe. At this stage, the translators were mainly among the Faculty members of SBU. The second phase of the project was specifically aimed at building a Consortium of Iranian Colleges and Universities, to work together as joint partners in coordinating translation efforts and providing access to the highest quality education, in order to help provide a platform for a common, high-level learning design within our country (Iran). At this stage, many universities expressed their intention to promote cooperation with MIT as an advanced educational resource of the world in teaching and research. As a result, the project received generous support from seven other Iranian Universities. This phase included the translation and publication of 35 MIT courses. Keeping in mind the vision and mission of the project, the courses were selected to cover various educational matters with the greatest impact

for the Faculties and Institutes of SBU and Iran. Accordingly, the participants (faculty members) were asked to find the courses related to their fields on the MIT OCW site and browse through the course selections for translation and to check the quality of content prior to signing agreements for the translation process. IL: How long, on average, did it take to complete the translation of a full course (from the time of starting with the translation until it was published on the website)? MM: Depending on the time for completing the translation of full courses by faculties, it averagely took 6 to 9 months for the whole process. IL: How many individuals at SBU were involved in carrying out translations? MM: The first phase of the project, within which the translators were mainly among the Faculty members of SBU, included 29 members, and in the second phase 35 faculty members from SBU as well as other Iranian universities were involved; this totally includes 64 individuals. IL: Was the translation of MIT OCW at SBU supported institutionally? Were translators compensated for the time spent on translating of MIT OCW? MM: In carrying out the Translation Project, SBU took responsibility for funding all aspects of the translation and distribution process.

In addition to the financial matter, the related technical facilities, support, and services were also provided by SBU. Several workshops have also been organized to familiarize the translators with the content and the translation process. IL: Did you have any control mechanisms in place to ensure that the translated content was accurate? MM: In addition to appointing a senior program manager, Mahinnaz Mirdehghan (Ph.D in General Linguistics) for managing the relationship and coordinating design, editorial, and translation work, the quality assurance of translations and enhancements of the materials was mainly provided by the faculty members who participated in the project, while a final approval and review of the translated works was also provided by the senior manager. Furthermore, MIT OCW also provided Translation Quality Assurance Reports for 7 courses randomly, in accordance with Meaning (accuracy of translation, inclusion of important concepts, interpretation of MIT-specific or English-specific terms, â&#x20AC;Ś) and Form (spelling, grammar, style, punctuation) criteria. The translated courses got links on their MIT OCW homepage directly to the Shahid Beheshtitranslated version in Persian after the completion of this procedure. IL: Have the translated MIT courses been incorporated into the curriculum at SBU?

MM: The point depends on the lecturers. I, as a lecturer at SBU and a translator of the course# 24.900- Introduction to Linguistics- found it very helpful in my teaching to incorporate the translated MIT course with my own personal academic interests. The matter means a combination of online and offline educational systems, which has also helped me to diversify my teaching techniques to accomplish educational objectives, such as task submissions, uploading teaching materials, class information sharing, and test item submission. IL: In your view, what have been some of the main benefits of this initiative thus far to: - Students at SBU? MM: Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s beneficial for students in improving their knowledge, as well as being counted as additional resources in completing their related university courses. - Faculty members at SBU? MM: Based on a questionnaire addressed to the faculty members who participated in the first phase of the SBU-MIT OCW project, we find that they are now much more willing to use the combined online and offline educational systems as a blended learning system. They are also ready and more able to diversify their teaching techniques to accomplish educational objectives: such as task submissions and feedback, Q & A, uploading of teaching materials, class information sharing, group discussions, and mutual feedback.

- General public in Iran? MM: The statistics about the visits to our translation project illustrate the general public interest in the translated courses. IL: The OCW project at SBU started by doing translations of MIT OCW. Recently, SBU started publishing its own courses as OCW. Can you please comment on how this initiative has evolved? MM: As noted earlier, the vision of the joint project has been to serve as a first step for the advancement of OCW in Iran to organize the OCW Consortium of Iranian Universities (IR OCW), which can speed up the use of countrywide, interoperable, open learning materials. SBU initiated a pilot IR OCW by producing seven original Persian courses in the OpenCourseWare format. This can be seen as a third OCW phase of our university. The first three are published on the SBU OpenCourseWare website (http://ocw.sbu.ac.ir), and the rest are to be published soon. IL: Based on your experiences at SBU, what would be your advice to institutions or people who would like to start with translations of OCW into various languages? What factors do they need to consider?

MM: According to our experience, starting a translation project of OCW courses will be a good start for institutions which are planning to establish blended and e-learning systems. This can be useful in familiarizing their faculty for this purpose and also in accomplishing a common highlevel design for countrywide, interoperable learning materials to be achieved. In general, the factors to be considered are to provide a translation scheme, including primary mission, vision and goals of the project, its pilot scopes and strategic planning to evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats involved in it. Noteworthy is that in spite of the rapid development of IT, a lot of faculty members are still suspicious of using online education, which might simply be due to being inconvenienced and having a lack of technological experience, among other things.

In this regard, by planning an OCW translation project, institutes can be fairly successful at facilitating online educational strategies, which can also be effective in achieving respectable educational outcomes. It allows a combination of online and offline education systems to establish a platform for a common high-level design for blended learning in countries, and its progression as a consortium of Universities and research institutes can speed up the use of interoperable learning materials. The spirit of open sharing also inspires sharing membersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; scholarship with others, as hundreds of other universities are already doing through their own OCWs. For more information, visit http://mit-ocw.sbu.ac.ir/; http://ocw.sbu.ac.ir or email Prof. Mahinnaz Mirdehghan (M_Mirdehghan@sbu.ac.ir).

SBU OCW Site Visits

Source: Web Traffic Statistics: First Quarter of 2011, SBU

Modifications of OCWs: The ability to modify, or remix, OCW materials is one of its key benefits. One type of remix involves OCW materials produced in one country adapted to include local examples in order to make the learning relevant in different context. This form of localizing can have vast benefits to both sides. An institution or an organization can find fundamental theories in specific subject areas and localize them with examples that are context specific. The producers of the original OCW can, in turn, utilize the modified materials in their teaching, providing a more enriching learning experience to learners. Learners who have first acquired broad knowledge in a specific subject area and who then focus in on context-specific examples, are better prepared to work in a globalized world. An interesting example in this regard comes from courses on water management/drinking water engineering that were developed at Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in the Netherlands and then adapted and modified with local examples by Institut Teknologi Bandung (Indonesia), Tshwane University of Technology (Pretoria, Republic of South Africa,) the University of the Dutch Antilles (Curacao) and the National University of Singapore. In each case, a lecturer from the local university presents additional information in the native language regarding the application of water treatment processes relevant to local circumstances. Although it is too early to talk about the specific outcomes or impact of this project for all sides, there is a considerable amount of excitement among the lecturers at TU Delft about the ways such localized materials will eventually impact their own teaching practices and student experiences in the classroom:

Prof. Jasper Verberk (http://citg.tudelft.nl/index.php?i d=20650&L=1) â&#x20AC;&#x153;I certainly want to make use of the localized material that will be developed in another countries. Fundamental theory on water treatment is not country specific. However the application is. So when I can make use of their local developed material, it will enrich my teaching material. Furthermore, questions and answers will be developed by different institutions using totally different set points or water qualities (for example a river in Indonesia will have a totally different water quality than in the Netherlands, a high and very fluctuating turbidity compared to a low and stable turbidity in the Netherlands). This will make these questions and answers interesting for my students as it will broaden their scopeâ&#x20AC;? Prof. Jasper Verberk, TU Delft, Netherlands

Prof. Verberk stated further that although Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB) in Indonesia does not have an OCW hosting facility yet, plans are underway to set up an OCW homepage at ITB in the upcoming months. For the time being, the content developed at ITB will be hosted on one of TU Delftâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Blackboard pages, and through a link people visiting the website in Indonesia will be directed to the OCW website that Prof. Verberk will host. More information about this project will be available towards the end of 2011. For more information, please visit http://www.ocwconsortium.org/ en/community/casestudies/socia lchange or email Prof. Jasper Verberk: J.Q.J.C.Verberk@tudelft.nl Working on similar OCW initiatives? Email us at: newsletter@ocwconsortium.org ;feedback@ocwconsortium.org.

Licensing OpenCourseWare Perhaps one of the most important aspects to consider with the localization of OCWs, whether with translations or modification, is the type of license that was applied to the original materials. At the Consortium, we encourage the use of Creative Commons (CC) licenses. CC licenses provide an alternative to the traditional â&#x20AC;&#x153;all rights reservedâ&#x20AC;? options and clearly stipulate what one can and cannot do with OCWs without first having to contact the original copyright holder for permission. CC licenses* go hand in had with Open Educational Resources because they permit use, reuse, remix and redistribution. The ability to localize (translate, modify, or improve on existing OCWs) gets at the heart of the OER movement. This section of the newsletter presents different types of CC licenses and discuses their compatibility.

Attribution (CC BY) This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials.

Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they both credit you and license their new creations under identical terms. Any new works based on yours will carry the same license. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and it is recomme3nded for materials that might incorporate content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects.

Attribution-NoDerivs (CC BY-ND) This license allows for redistribution, whether commercial or non-commercial, of your work, as long as the portion passed along is unchanged and whole, with credit to the original author of the work.

Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work, but only non-commercially. Although the new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA) This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under identical terms.

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND) This license is the most restrictive of the six main licenses, allowing others to download your works but only to share those works with others if they both credit you and refrain from changing the works in any way or using the works commercially. Information in this table was adapted from the Creative Commons website

*In addition to CC licenses, another important issue to consider is the file format of included materials (images, text, audio or video). Open file formats can make it easier to localize materials. To learn more click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_format.

Compatibility of CC Licenses The CC licenses’ compatibility is particularly crucial to localization efforts. When deciding which license to apply to an OCW, consider whether the license encourages, hinders or discourages localization. Also, remember that the conditions of any CC license can be waived with the permission of the copyright holder.

This Compatibility Chart shows that resources under a CC BY license can be combined with resources licensed under any other CC license, and may be re-licensed under any other CC license. CC BY is the license most compatible with other CC licenses, and, as a result, we recommend CC BY for use in OER. You cannot apply a CC BY license to your OER, however, if you have used or remixed materials available under our more restrictive licenses. Below we explain which licenses you may use in such cases, depending on the license terms of the underlying resources: •

•

Resources licensed under CC BY-NC can only be remixed or adapted into resources licensed under an NC (Non-Commercial) term: e.g. CC BY-NC, CC BY-NC-SA, and CC BY-NC-ND. Resources licensed under CC BY-SA and CC BY-NC-SA (due to the SA term) can only be incorporated into derivative works relicensed under the same terms (e.g. BY-SA with BYSA, and BY-NC-SA with BY-NC-SA). Resources licensed under CC BY-ND and CC BY-NC-ND cannot be incorporated into a derivative work, and therefore they may not be relicensed, due to the ND (No Derivatives) term in the license.

Compatibility Chart and explanation adapted from “Remixing OER: A Guide to License Compatibility,” produced by ccLearn and licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. For more information, visit Creative Commons (creativecommons.org) or send questions

directly to cclearn-info@creativecommons.org. We also recommend Ahrash N. Bissell, “Permission granted: open licensing for educational resources,” available online at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02680510802627886. Finally, if you are interested in Intellectual Property issues, consider joining the “Intellectual Property” group on our Communities of Interest Site (http://communities.ocwconsortium.org/groups/intellectual-property/).

Reports from OER Meetings Around the World The CC Global Summit The Creative Commons (CC) 2011 Global Summit (http://wiki.creativecommons. org/Global_Summit_2011) was held from 16-18 September in Warsaw, Poland. The Summit brought together Affiliates from around the world with partners and members of the global CC community. Cathy Casserly, who began the position of CEO for Creative Commons about 6 months ago, was joined by staff and board members to engage participants in discussions about the organization’s future. Claudio Ruiz, one of the two Regional Managers (http://creativecommons.org/ weblog/entry/28403) for Latin America, emphasized to participants that CC is both a legal tool and a movement. This was evident in the presentations and discussions over the three days, which ranged from exciting musical performances to definitions of “non commercial” to building an affiliate team. A conversation is beginning on the creation of version 4.0 of CC licenses, which would address copyright on a global scale, reducing the need to port the licenses to different jurisdictions. Look for discussion opportunities for version 4.0 over the coming year. OER and the power of open in education were featured at the summit.

CC is leading the Learning Resource Metadata Initiative (LRMI http://wiki.creativecommons.org/L RMI) with the Association of Educational Publishers. This project will seek to develop a common education metadata vocabulary to be used by publishers of educational materials, whether as OER or as copyrighted material, with the goal of allowing greater discovery and customization of searches for learning resources. Cable Green was recently appointed the Director of Global Learning for CC. Cable (http://creativecommons.org/weblog/e ntry/27223) is reaching out to the

global OER community to get input into CC’s education strategy. Summit participants spent two hours on Sunday morning discussing CC education priorities, including starting a “School of Open” with P2PU, supporting the development and sharing of open policies / legislation, increasing OER activities in CC regional networks, and developing the capability to track the re-use and the evolution of derivatives from CC licensed content. Watch the CC blog (http://creativecommons.org/webl og) for more information, and check out the newly redesigned Creative Commons website (http://creativecommons.org). The United Nations Academic Impact Forum The United Nations Academic Impact Forum was held from

August 10-12 in Seoul, Korea. Hosted by the Korea Council for University Education, the Forum focused on sharing intellectual and social responsibility. The UNAIF was held for the purpose of calling all universities to participate in addressing issues of the Millennium Development Goals. A welcome address from YoungGil Kim, President of Handong Global University and the Chairman of the Korean Council for University Education was followed by an address by Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations. Subsequent presentations addressed the issues of sustainable development, development through education, and capacity building. Although it was not an OCW or OER related forum, many of the speakers represented OCW Consortium member institutions, and many spoke of technology and sharing as the focal point of future activities. Getachew Engida, Deputy Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, spoke on the “Role of UNESCO in Promoting International Cooperation in Education.” He asserted that there is no way traditional classrooms can meet the demand for higher education in the world. He then argued that, “fundamentally, capacity building is about knowledgebuilding through knowledgesharing.” He offered OER as a solution, as it can provide informal education to many. His

emphasis on OER elicited significant interest among many participants. Dr. Tully Cornick is the Executive Director of Higher Education for Development (HED), whose mission is to support partnerships between US universities and host country institutions that address local and national development issues. One HED project aims to strengthen higher education systems through faculty and expert exchanges. Many of our members have already worked with HED, for example, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health created an open course titled “Enhanced Teaching and Learning: A Public Health Perspective” funded through an HED program, and the University of Cape Town has been the primary partner for the Nano-Power Africa project. The RFA and more information can be found at www.hedprogram.org. In the closing remarks, Ramu Damodaran, Chief of the UN, posed an interesting challenge: knowledge doubles every 18 months; how can universities keep up, assimilate, and share all the new knowledge? This is a perfect invitation to continue the discussion of the impacts and potential of OCW and OER. The International Summer School on High Performance Computing & Cloud Computing for Sustainable Development

This conference was held on Sept. 12-16 at the Ovidius University of Constantza, Romania. During this event, Meena Hwang of the OCWConsortium gave a presentation virtually on how OCW is transforming higher education. Youngsup Kim, Provost of Handong Global University and board member of the OCW Consortium was there in person to talk about the UNESCO Initiative for OCW and OER. Professor Eden Mamut, Director of the Black Sea University Network, believes that this was a movement that all universities in the Black Sea region should know about to improve the quality of education and to promote sustainability in higher education in a broader sense. Many faculty members took interest in both using OCW materials and creating open content. In a discussion that followed presentations on OCW, Prof. Mamut promised to continue to be strong supporter of OCW in the Black Sea region. OER Professional Wanted Creative Commons is seeking highly motivated and organized individuals to fill two positions: Senior Project Manager and Senior Project Analyst. For more information click here :(http://www.ocwconsortium.or g/en/community/blog/2011/09/ 13/open-positions-in-openeducation/). The deadline is 7 October 2011.

Community Updates

Education-Portal.com has organized the Education Resources People's Choice Awards. For the list of nominees and to vote please click here (http://educationportal.com/articles/Education_Res ources_Peoples_Choice_Awards.h tml). Dr. Tomoaki Watanabe, Assistant Professor at Center for Global Communications, International University of Japan, is conducting research on the use of online materials in higher education institutions. The study aims at drawing recommendations for OpenCourseWare by examining teaching practices. If you teach at a university and would like to help with the study, please fill out a survey at http://bit.ly/psIKIT. The fourth Digital Media for Learning Competition (http://www.dmlcompetition.net/) has recently been announced, offering two tracks focusing on badges. The first, Badges for Lifelong Learning, offers awards ranging from US$10,000 to $80,000 to build digital badges for lifelong learning. The competition is open to groups with “badgefriendly” content, educators, designers, developers, technologists and learning assessment strategists. The second competition focuses on research into non-traditional assessment, such as badges and trophies, with grants ranging from US$5,000 to $80,000. Application deadlines for both programs are 28 Nov. 2011.

Consortium News and Updates Please visit our website for news links and blogs to keep up with what is happening in OER around the world. Better yet, you can like us on Facebook (OCWConsortium) or follow us on Twitter (OCW News) to be updated in real time. If you have something to share email us at: newsletter@ocwconsortium.org or feedback@ocwconsortium.org and let us know! Call for Papers OCWC Global Welcome New Members Call for Participation: 2012 Awards for OpenCourseWare The OCW Consortium and the Committee Institutional Support Centre for Open Resources in Education The 2012 Awards for Queensborough Community (SCORE) of The Open OpenCourseWare (ACE) College (http://qcc.cuny.edu), University in the UK invite Committee is seeking members USA session proposals for their to help refine the program for Kirkwood Community combined 2012 global its second year and to judge College conference, Innovation and nominees for the awards to be (http://www.kirkwood.edu), Impact: Openly collaborating to presented at the 2012 Global USA enhance education, April 16-18 OpenCourseWare Consortium San Diego Community in Cambridge, UK. For more Meeting April 16-18 in College District information click here: http:// Cambridge, UK. For more (http://www.sdccd.edu), USA conferences.ocwconsortium.org information click here (http://www.ocwconsortium.org Organizational /en/community/blog/2011/09/1 9/call-for-participation-2012Hudong.com awards-for-opencourseware(http://www.hudong.com), committee/) China OpenCourseWare Consortium PO Box 251, Newton, MA 02464, USA www.ocwconsortium.org feedback@ocwconsortium.org