COLT projects

Open Education Collaborative Documentation Project (active)

 * Main outputs:
 * Compose canonical and widely published history and account of Open Education
 * Strengthen international Open Education community as a vibrant community of practice
 * Funding: Private foundation funds necessary

There are numerous projects worldwide generating Open Educational Resources (OER), promoting Open Educational Practices (OEP), and generating Open Access (OA) peer reviewed journal content. But the understanding and adoption of Open Education in the broader education world is lacking. The resources exist, but even the good ones go unused. Educators lack the practical understanding of OER/OEP/OA that would support wider leveraging of these resources.

This project will aim to improve the overall coverage of Open Education in places where interested parties are already looking for information, by generating high quality Wikipedia content, in several languages, on Open Education topics. Where Wikipedia is not appropriate, participants will identify the best platforms to tell the more detailed or advocacy-oriented parts of the story. Through this work, it will strengthen the mutual awareness, sense of shared purpose, and synergies among existing Open Education projects.

Open Education Center at Ole Miss (in discussion)

 * Main output: Case studies that inform Open Education decisions by schools, professors
 * Funding: Private foundation funds necessary

At the University of Mississippi, COLT will sponsor a team of tenure-stream faculty (with joint appointments in traditional academic departments).

Faculty sponsored by COLT will develop, execute, and document teaching projects rooted in Open Educational Resources (OER) and Practices (OEP), in partnership with student learners, as alternatives to traditional courses. Participants will locate emerging resources, and craft a semester-long student experience which will yield student learning outcomes equivalent to a course in the individual faculty member’s discipline. Faculty will contribute to and ensure the reliability of the sources, as well as the rigor and relevance of the project in accordance with their discipline’s pedagogical standards for undergraduate learning.

Each student will author an ePortfolio to demonstrate attainment of the appropriate outcomes for assessment, as well as to articulate the integration of their experience into a lifelong personal learning plan.

International Research Consortium (in discussion)

 * Main output: Research that informs Open Education decisions by schools, professors
 * Funding: Low costs (mainly for facilitator, travel) would be borne by participants; seed funding may be desirable

COLT will focus on research into the use of Open Educational Resources (OER) and Practices (OEP) in formal education. It will work with research teams from around the world, facilitating them in supporting, evaluating, and refining one another’s work, and building toward free publication in an open access, peer reviewed publication.

Teams of researchers will participate in COLT’s three-year cohorts. COLT will facilitate two meetings per year for each cohort; researchers will work together to refine research questions, develop methodologies, and document their findings.

The findings of each cohort will be compiled and published by an academic press. These volumes will be a useful resource for educators and institutions looking to use OER and OEP with effective and tested methods.

Quality Enhancement Plan consulting team (in discussion)

 * Main outputs:
 * Establish specific frameworks (resources and other incentives) within universities that promote engagement with Open Education
 * Establish the University of Mississippi as a leader in this emerging field
 * Funding: No independent funding needed. (Schools would pay for consulting services.) Seed funding may be desirable.

In the southeastern United States, the accreditation system establishes an environment where universities are “shopping for change” every ten years. SACS, the region’s accrediting body, requires every university to define a Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP), in which it commits to improving its own pedagogy according to a certain credible rubric.

The team would develop materials outlining the development of a QEP centering on Open Educational Practices and Resources, and present at relevant conferences, as well as reaching out to academic administrators through its professional network. Resources to support the development of the pitch and conference presentations would be the only investment necessary.

With the establishment of one or more QEPs at southern universities, the framework, commitment, and resources necessary for a genuine investment in OER/OEP would be established, smoothing the path for local efforts to deepen and strengthen the use of OER/OEP.

COLT founder Cummings has intimate experience with the QEP process, as it is the foundation of the writing center he currently runs; Quick and Hart have relevant backgrounds as well. Forsyth, as a designer of the Wikipedia Public Policy Initiative and other broad Wikipedia-related consulting projects, has the consulting requisite experience to perform advocacy and project management.