NorthTec is a regional polytechnic in New Zealand with over 300 staff and 6,500 equivalent full-time students. It has 2 campuses and 6 learning centers across Northland. Students are taught through traditional, blended, video conferencing and online methods. The challenges include limited broadband access, financial constraints, and ensuring education for all. NorthTec is exploring the use of open educational resources (OER) and the OERu network to reduce costs, improve the quality of resources, develop digital skills, and create a more sustainable and collaborative learning environment. Their initial steps involve building OER awareness, reviewing policies, developing staff capabilities, and contributing courses to the OERu prototype pilot program.

1. Flexible Learning
Manager
@
Vasi Doncheva

2. NorthTec
Regional Polytechnic in New Zealand:
•Over 300 staff
•Average 6,500 students equivalent to
2,800 full time students

3. Where we deliver
2 Campuses
6 Learning Centres
and many Delivery Points and
mobile learning sites across
Northland

4. Our Students

5. Our programmes

6. How we deliver
• Traditional face-to-face
• Blended
• Video Conferencing
• Online
• In community

7. The challenges
• Broadband access
• Financial situation
• Education for everyone!
Source: Wikimedia Courtesy of Svilen.milev

8. Why OER and OERu?
The challenges:
–Accessibility of resources
–The quality of resources
–Staff capability especially in digital and information
literacies
–Cost effective use of resources

9. Why OER and OERu?
The benefits:
• Reduce cost of teaching • Promote essential digital
and learning resources. competencies.
• Optimise and refocus • Improve quality control
teacher time/ workload of content and learning
and increase productivity. resources.
• Reduce expenditure on • Create an open,
licensed/ subscription sustainable, flexible and
information resources. adaptive learning
environment.
• Increase ROI on course
• Develop a culture of
development.
sharing and collaboration.

10. Our journey so far

11. What are the next steps
Phase 1: Phase 2:
preparing for the OERu official launch of OERu in
prototype pilot running 2013
second half of 2012
Build OER awareness Use OER for course development of Introduce OER into main stream
online courses and promote OER programmes
resources to academic staff
Institutional readiness Review and change IP and RPL Improve and align RPL and credentialing
policy to be OER friendly policies and processes with OERu partners
Contribute OER courses Convert the course we are Increase the number of courses contributed
contributing from Moodle to Wiki as more staff develop the skills to create
format them as OER
Develop capability OCL4Ed and eL4C52 Wikieducator Promote OCL4Ed, eL4C and other
workshops for staff involved in the Wikieducator workshops to all academic
pilot staff

12. Thank you
Source: Wikimedia Courtesy of Rugby471
Vasi Doncheva
vdoncheva@northtec.ac.nz
playnice_nz