Presentation by Alan Tait, The Open University, UK for the European Distance Learning Week's third day webinar on "Evolving Open Education: life beyond MOOCs" - 9 November 2016 Recording of the discussion is available here: https://eden-online.adobeconnect.com/p6ax1hqjijs/

1. Open education at the
macro level: how could
policy help?
ALAN TAIT
PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF DISTANCE EDUCATION AND DEVELOPMENT
THE OPEN UNIVERSITY UK
alan.tait@open.ac.uk

2. Open Education and Open Practices
 OEP
 From projects to policy to embedding of sustainable practices
 Open publishing: articles, journals and books
 Open text books
 Open Educational Resources
 MOOCs
 Digital revolution is enabler and driver for change
 Anti-commoditisation: from commodities to commons
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3. Open publishing: articles, journals and books
From projects to collaboration and policy
 Institutional and Research Council policy now in place e.g. gold and green routes
 Open Archives: collaboration drives policy
 Open Access Journals funded by universities and Professional Associations
 Much more than projects
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4. Open text books
 British Columbia Provincially funded post secondary open text books
 See https://open.bccampus.ca
 More than project
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5. Open Educational Resources
 Many!
 Open Learn has 5m visitors per year
 OER University
 But innovative projects with rhetoric run ahead of outcomes
 Policy not yet embedding innovation or lower cost opportunity
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6. MOOCs
 35m users world-wide
 Major insertional policy and commitment
 Digital innovation feeding back on to campus
 Many unanswered questions: quality; student persistence; business model;
futures
 MOOCs have demonstrated enormous demand
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7. Anti-commoditisation
 from educational commodities to commons
 Scandal of publically funded research outputs being paid for again by
public through expensive journals
 Cost of higher education in North America and England
 Openness and access inherent in potential of web revolution
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8. From projects to policy: commodity or
commons?
 Projects vulnerable to short-term financing and exhaustion
 Policy drives and confirms sustainability
 UNESCO open education policy is helpful but can be ignored
 EU ‘Policy recommendations for Opening Up Education’
 Some important institutional policies
 But policy with funding at national levels lacking
 Risk of exhaustion by innovators and ‘next new thing’ by philanthropic
Foundations
 Battle for outcome of digital revolution in education: commodities or
commons?
alan.tait@open.ac.uk
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