Re: Interest in extending schema.org to cover (online) courses?

[Peter Pinch]

Hi Aaron. I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to cross-post my response
to the LRMI list.

I can't claim any authority on LRMI, but I've been assuming that the group
is interested in metadata on courses. And there's a explicit goal in
Schema.org and LRMI to be able describe offline objects. So any
shortcomings you see for describing online or offline courses should be of
interest to the group.

In implementation, one of the goals of LRMI is to re-use existing
schema.org types (and properties) whenever possible. So, if I understand
things correctly, you should be able to apply the proposed LRMI properties
to the schema.org Events type. I wasn't aware of Event until you brought
it up, but I can see it would help me indicate when a course was
originally taught.

For better or for worse, MIT OCW decided a long time ago that the
instructors were the authors of the course. So we consider those
equivalent. I recognize that this may not work in other circumstances.

I agree the credit and accreditation is missing. That wasn't a concern for
me until a few days ago. =)

- Peter

-----------
Peter Pinch
Production Manager, MIT OpenCourseWare
http://ocw.mit.edu



P.S. I just posted my first test of applying schema.org/LRMI to an
OpenCourseWare course on the LRMI list.

http://www.hawklake.com/courses/electrical-engineering-and-computer-science
/6-003-signals-and-systems-spring-2010/index.htm




-----Original Message-----
From: Aaron Bradley <aara...@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: Aaron Bradley <aara...@yahoo.com>
Date: Monday, April 30, 2012 2:17 PM
To: Peter Pinch <pdp...@mit.edu>, Public Vocabs <public...@w3.org>
Subject: Re: Interest in extending schema.org to cover (online) courses?

>
>
>Thanks for the response, Peter.
>
>I was thinking, too, that for online courses LRMI may be largely
>sufficient. It was when I got to thinking about an "online course" as a
>more specific type of a"course" that the seemed to be a divergence in
>required meta data.
>
>Whether online or brick-and-mortar instruction, here are some thoughts
>about specific metadata.
>
>Temporal Issues
>
>
>timeRequired seems to be a good addtion, and schema.org/Duration indeed
>seems to fit the bill here for online courses. But for actual in-class
>instruction the Event properties startDate and endDate would be useful.
>
>Instructor
>
>For online courses, the "Already adequately expressed in Schema.org"
>table has good coverage for authorship (perhaps you can clarify, though,
>when the property is at variance from an existing property is that an
>addition, or would the "Thing:name" property be what would be used in
>schema.org microdata markup - e.g. does the LMRI propose the creation of
>a "topic" property, or is this a descriptor for the existing "about"
>property?).
>
>For in-class instruction though these seems inadequate, and something
>akin to the "performer" property of http://schema.org/Event seems
>appropriate (though "performer" is a stretch even for the specific event
>type EducationEvent). This is true also of webcasts and interactive
>video instruction.
>
>Credits and Accreditation
>
>
>For all course types, there's no property that expresses whether or not a
>course is accredited, by which organization a course is accredited, what
>accreditation this course may count toward (certificate, diploma, degree,
>etc.), and the number of credits earned upon successful completion of a
>course. These are important consideration for courses of all types.
>
>
>Location of the Course
>
>
>For brick-and-mortar courses or interactive courses with a
>brick-and-mortar component this is a consideration (and I would say
>well-handled by the EducationEvent/location property).
>
>Offers
>
>Probably unnecessary for the LMRI spec, as there's no reason one couldn't
>use it - but certainly whether for a textbook or a course, there might be
>offer components to be marked up.
>
>Bigger Questions
>
>
>Can a course of instruction be considered a "learning resource?" On one
>hand - perhaps - as described by the learningResourceType in the proposed
>LMRI properties, but as an otherwise undefined Text type, there's nothing
>to prevent one coder from marking up a resource as an "Online Class,"
>another as an "Online Course," and so on.
>
>In a way the fact the LMRI example wraps the entire resource in
>schema.org/Book (and doesn't use learningResourceType) kind of
>illustrates my point. LMRI properties are well-suited to already-defined
>creative works, but a "course" - online or otherwise - doesn't fall
>neatly under the more specific types listed under CreativeWork, and
>indeed (especially for brick and mortar courses) is more akin to an
>Intangible.
>
>
>One of the reasons I reached out was to explore whether or not there's
>utility in extending schema.org to cover both brick-and-mortar classroom
>courses and courses delivered online by positing a new type. For an
>online course specifically, a combination of proposed LMRI properties,
>properties from CreativeWork, properties from EducationEvent and
>properties from Offer would probably suffice. Thinking of this from a
>hypothetical utility perspective, would marking up (online) courses allow
>users to get an result for the query "show me (online) courses offered by
>the University of Alberta" or "show me (online) courses taught by
>(authored by) John Doe"? I don't see how.
>
>But this is admittedly my first stab at such an extension, so maybe I'm
>entirely off the mark. And my apologies if I'm all over the map with
>this - very much preliminary thoughts on this. I look forward to further
>feedback and - especially - any OCW preliminary examples that might be
>provided.
>
>Thanks,
>Aaron Bradley
>
>
>>________________________________
>> From: Peter Pinch <pdp...@MIT.EDU>
>>To: Aaron Bradley <aara...@yahoo.com>; Public Vocabs
>><public...@w3.org>
>>Sent: Monday, April 30, 2012 7:10:49 AM
>>Subject: Re: Interest in extending schema.org to cover (online) courses?
>>
>>Aaron -
>>
>>I've been doing some experiments with LRMI and MIT OpenCourseWare
>>courses.
>>I would be curious to know where you are finding LRMI to be lacking (the
>>LRMI folks may be curious too).
>>
>>In a lot of ways, OCW materials are more akin to learning resource than
>>an
>>online course, so I may be overlooking the metadata you're interested in
>>exposing. What kind of objects/fields are you looking for?
>>
>>I'm hoping I'll be able to post some of my tests shortly to the LRMI
>>mailing list, which should make this a more concrete discussion.
>>
>>- Peter Pinch
>>
>>
>>Peter Pinch | Production Manager, OpenCourseWare
>>Massachusetts Institute of Technology
>>One Broadway, 8th Floor | Cambridge MA 02142
>>T 617.253.6256 | C 617.652.0183
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Aaron Bradley <aara...@yahoo.com>
>>Reply-To: Aaron Bradley <aara...@yahoo.com>
>>Date: Friday, April 27, 2012 8:17 PM
>>To: Public Vocabs <public...@w3.org>
>>Subject: Interest in extending schema.org to cover (online) courses?
>>Resent-From: <public...@w3.org>
>>Resent-Date: Friday, April 27, 2012 8:17 PM
>>
>>>One of the web properties I work on offers online courses (a class
>>>delivered 100% online), short courses (a class formally presented at a
>>>brick-and-mortar location) and webcasts (live or recorded classes
>>>provided by video). Most online and short sources are accredited (they
>>>count toward certificates or diplomas awarded either by accredited
>>>educational institutions like a university, or by a professional
>>>organization).
>>>
>>>To this end I've been working on marking up these offerings with
>>>schema.org microdata - insofar as this is possible. While the short
>>>courses *might* be suitable candidates for the EducationEvent type, and
>>>while the webcasts *might* in future be addressable as an learning
>>>resource in the event that the LMRI [1] becomes a published standard,
>>>there's no type (with attendant properties and defined values) that
>>>really addresses an online course.
>>>
>>>As I've been mulling over and doing some preliminary work on an
>>>extension
>>>that would describe an online course, three things struck me.
>>>
>>>First, that an "online course" is just a more specific type of an
>>>obvious
>>>parent not currently addressed by any type - a "course" (i.e. a discreet
>>>program of instruction).
>>>
>>>Second, that being able to assign metadata to courses might be a
>>>tremendously useful thing for both students and educational
>>>institutions.
>>> There are probably millions of courses listed on the web.
>>>
>>>Third, that there may well have been work done on in this realm already.
>>>However - while I've not done an exhaustive search - most ontologies and
>>>vocabularies I have encountered (like the LRMI initiative) seem to be
>>>focused on learning resources rather than learning programs (differing
>>>in
>>>that, among other things, the latter most often has a temporal
>>>component).
>>>
>>>So ... reaching out to see what level of interest there might be in such
>>>an extension, whether or not anyone on the list has worked on a course
>>>vocabulary already (or knows of such work), and to welcome any would-be
>>>collaborators.
>>>
>>>I should note here that my aim here is schema.org-centric. That is, my
>>>goal is to create the required type(s) and properties for schema.org
>>>microdata, rather than general metadata for courses of which schema.org
>>>would only be one application. I'm aiming to reuse as much of what is
>>>already available as possible (and much is covered off with existing
>>>types and properties), and limit the additions to only what's necessary.
>>>
>>>Below are a couple of examples from the wild of the sort of resources
>>>I'd
>>>be targeting.
>>>
>>>Thanks!
>>>Aaron Bradley
>>>
>>>EXAMPLES
>>>
>>>Courses taken in-person
>>>
>>>Example - A course offered by the University of Glasgow
>>>http://www.gla.ac.uk/coursecatalogue/course/?code=ARCH1002
>>>
>>>Courses taken online
>>>
>>>Example - A course offered by the University of Texas at Austin
>>>http://courses.webhost.utexas.edu/dec/college/coursedetails.cfm?CourseID
>>>=5
>>>18
>>>
>>>Example
>>>
>>>[1] http://www.lrmi.net/
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>

[Zoe]

Interesting.

There has been some discussion on this list already about
'qualification' (Like Peter, I have been much in favour of seeing in
the LRMI in some form.)

Quoting Peter...

> >Credits and Accreditation
>
> >For all course types, there's no property that expresses whether or not a
> >course is accredited, by which organization a course is accredited, what
> >accreditation this course may count toward (certificate, diploma, degree,
> >etc.), and the number of credits earned upon successful completion of a
> >course.  These are important consideration for courses of all types.

'Qualification' as a standalone has problematic edges as it can
contain inconsistent vocabulary (there are a lot of end-of-school
exams out there) and starts to veer towards something that looks like
it should be internally mappable but isn't (England's last years of
school are slightly different from Scotland's - and Spain's, and
Uganda's, and so on.)

Reading Peter's comments, it occurs to me that we could get an awful
lot of utility out of:

- Qualifying organisation

in combination with

- Qualification name

What I didn't realise before just now is that the qualification names
that have been tripping us up are actually meaningless outside the
context of qualifying organisation.

Examples:

Matriculation requires a school system
Degrees require an awarding institution
Trade certification requires a trade bodies
Brownie badges require the Brownies

This actually emerges as a lovely mirroring of the structure of RDF
(one for you there, Dan, if you're still around) - it turns out that
qualification statements are only meaningful when the two conditions
for a meaningful RDF statement are met:

a) we know what was said
b) we know who said it

It is correct to not assume equivalence between qualifications on the
basis of name - ask any Polish nurse trying to immigrate as a skilled
migrant to Australia, s/he will tell you that nursing degree !=
nursing degree! (See also - students moving between state education
systems in the US, students applying to UK universities with African
matriculation certificates, first aid certification, pretty much every
instance I can think of!)

(I also suspect qualification name + awarding body would make lovely
RDF triples, e.g. -

Where structure of a triple = subject - predicate - object
A triple for for qualifications = 'qualification name' - 'is managed
by' - 'awarding body')

What do people think? Useful or not useful?

Zoe

On May 7, 1:05 am, Peter Pinch <pdpi...@MIT.EDU> wrote:
> Hi Aaron. I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to cross-post my response
> to the LRMI list.
>
> I can't claim any authority on LRMI, but I've been assuming that the group
> is interested in metadata on courses. And there's a explicit goal in
> Schema.org and LRMI to be able describe offline objects. So any
> shortcomings you see for describing online or offline courses should be of
> interest to the group.
>
> In implementation, one of the goals of LRMI is to re-use existing
> schema.org types (and properties) whenever possible. So, if I understand
> things correctly, you should be able to apply the proposed LRMI properties
> to the schema.org Events type. I wasn't aware of Event until you brought
> it up, but I can see it would help me indicate when a course was
> originally taught.
>
> For better or for worse, MIT OCW decided a long time ago that the
> instructors were the authors of the course. So we consider those
> equivalent. I recognize that this may not work in other circumstances.
>
> I agree the credit and accreditation is missing. That wasn't a concern for
> me until a few days ago. =)
>
> - Peter
>
> -----------
> Peter Pinch

> Production Manager, MIT OpenCourseWarehttp://ocw.mit.edu

>
> P.S. I just posted my first test of applying schema.org/LRMI to an
> OpenCourseWare course on the LRMI list.
>

> http://www.hawklake.com/courses/electrical-engineering-and-computer-s...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Aaron Bradley <aaran...@yahoo.com>
>
> Reply-To: Aaron Bradley <aaran...@yahoo.com>

> Date: Monday, April 30, 2012 2:17 PM

> To: Peter Pinch <pdpi...@mit.edu>, Public Vocabs <public-voc...@w3.org>

> >> From: Peter Pinch <pdpi...@MIT.EDU>
> >>To: Aaron Bradley <aaran...@yahoo.com>; Public Vocabs
> >><public-voc...@w3.org>

[Peter Pinch]

A point of clarification: these comments were Aaron Bradley's. He made the
initial proposal about online courses on the w3c public-vocabs list, and I
thought this group should be aware of it.

Sorry for any confusion,
Peter