Fwd: School of Open Africa, Why Open? and more

[Jane Park]

Fyi - for those of you on this list who have yet to join the new SOO discussion, please do at http://community.p2pu.org/category/school-of-open !

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Jane Park <jane...@creativecommons.org>
Date: Wed, Aug 13, 2014 at 1:43 PM
Subject: School of Open Africa, Why Open? and more
To: school-of-o...@googlegroups.com

Hi everyone!

In case you missed it on the new School of Open blog, we've been busy gearing up for and running the following activities.

School of Open Africa to Launch in September

Kayode from Creative Commons Nigeria says: "Creative Commons Africa is set to storm Africa by having a continent-wide launch for School of Open in September. School of Open programs will be launched in Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria, and South Africa in September on a series of topics ranging from Creative Commons licensing, intellectual property protection, open society concepts, and the Linux operating system. Strategic collaborations are underway with the Mozilla Foundation, Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, WikiAfrica, University of Lagos, University of Tanzania, and the Institute of Educational Management Technology of the Open University of Tanzania to make the launch a success."

Learn more at http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/43400.

School of Open Maker Parties

School of Open, Creative Commons, and P2PU are excited to be partnering with Mozilla to celebrate teaching and learning the web with Maker Party. Through thousands of community-run events around the world, Maker Party unites educators, organizations and enthusiastic Internet users of all ages and skill levels.  We share Mozilla’s belief that the web is a global public resource that’s integral to modern life: it shapes how we learn, how we connect and how we communicate. But many of us don’t understand its basic mechanics or what it means to be a citizen of the web. That’s why we’re supporting this global effort to teach web literacy through hands-on learning and making with Maker Party.

We've already joined one in South Africa and have more planned in Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Nigeria, and Colombia. Learn more about Maker Party at https://party.webmaker.org/ and keep an eye on the blog for more info on each event as it gets finalized.

Why Open? course

Why Open?, a collaboratively facilitated four-week course around the many questions surrounding openness started its second run this week, but you're in luck if you still want to join as enrollment is on a rolling basis. What does open mean? Does it mean free? Does it mean without restriction? What is the role of the producer? What is the role of the consumer? Why is open important? How does open relate to you and your area of expertise? In this course, we will discuss and answer these questions. With your help, we will explore the different meanings of open in various contexts as well as its benefits and issues. You will use open practices to complete a series of open activities that builds into a final project.

Learn more at https://p2pu.org/en/courses/2314/why-open/.

Take the OER Research Hub Survey

We currently offer 15 stand-alone courses open for you to take at any time, any place. Some take a half-hour to complete; others take a bit longer. All are free! Now’s your chance to give us your feedback through a short 15 minute survey. The research is being carried out by the OER Research Hub at the Open University (UK) in collaboration with School of Open, and is funded by the Hewlett Foundation in order to support future excellence in open education. Your answers will help us build a picture of how people across the world use online resources for learning and teaching. This research data will help people around the world make more informed decisions about online teaching and learning. The results of this questionnaire will also be used to help improve future School of Open courses.

Take the survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/School_Of_Open_ALL

Open Research course

Interested in how to ethically and openly share your findings so that others can reuse or develop your work? Curious about which open research methods you could use? Or just want to find out more about what open research entails? Join us in September for a four-week exploration of researching using open tools and methods. This course is for anyone who wants to conduct an element of their research openly. This course will be led by the OER Research Hub project team and will launch in mid-September. We'll send out another announcement when sign-up for the course opens, but for now mark your calenders for four weeks starting 15 September.

Art and Culture of the Web at the Mozilla Festival

Mozilla Festival, the annual event celebrating hands-on projects involving the open web has a new track this year called "Art and Culture of the Web" and is calling on all artists, technologists, and curators to help make it a successful contribution to open culture. School of Open and Creative Commons will be proposing various sessions around open cultural heritage, remix, digital archives and education. Join us!

Learn more at http://mozfestartoftheweb.tumblr.com/. Ping me on this community thread if you want to help shape a session together. Deadline is next week - 22 August!

Join the Conversation

We have a new discussion forum which you can join by using an existing Google account or simply registering an account with the discussion tool itself. Head over to http://community.p2pu.org/category/school-of-open and join the conversation!

Best,
Jane

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Jane Park
Project Manager
Creative Commons

Get updates: http://bit.ly/commonsnews

School of Open: http://schoolofopen.org/

--

Jane Park
Project Manager
Creative Commons

Get updates: http://bit.ly/commonsnews

School of Open: http://schoolofopen.org/