This study examines the relationship between policy and practice in the world of open education. It draws largely on the findings of other research projects and their openly licensed outputs (e.g. Creative Commons, POERUP) to map open education policies. In this presentation we will take the audience on a 'world tour' of OER policy, highlighting important case studies and scaffolding a participative discussion where members of the OER community can refine their understanding of the key issues. Co-presented with Sara Frank Bristow (Salient Research) at OER14 (http://oer14.org/)

1. A Grand Tour of OER Policy
Dr. Rob Farrow
The Open University
Sara Frank Bristow
Salient Research

2. Structure
OER Research Hub
Policy Research
Milestones
Tour of OER Policy Map
Discussion

3. OER Research Hub
oerresearchhub.org
#oerrhub

4. • Research project at The Open University (UK)
• Funded by William & Flora Hewlett Foundation for two years
• Research team led by two professors
• Tasked with building the most comprehensive picture of OER impact
• Organised by 11 research hypotheses
• Collaboration model works across different educational sectors
• Research structured by hypothesis
OER Research Hub
oerresearchhub.org
#oerrhub

6. • Research instruments applied
consistently across collaborations:
surveys, interview questions,
focus groups, etc.
• Supplemented by integration of
secondary research
• ‘Agile’ research, sprinting
• Thematic and methodological
cohesion provided by research
hypotheses
Research Process

7. OER Policy
The OERRH hypothesis

8. Policy Hypothesis
• Consolidatory phase for OER movement after years of investment and piloting
• The need for an evidence base: advocacy, strategy, policymaking
• Lack of robust evidence for OER impact
• The evidence ‘problem’ in OER impact research
• Isolated ‘pockets of innovation’
• Has OER piloting led to expected level of policy innovation?
‘OER use encourages institutions to change their policies’

9. Policy Hypothesis: Reporting
What’s the latest?

10. Hypothesis Reporting

11. in service of The Open University
Hypothesis J Reporting

12. in service of The Open University

14. OER Impact Map
oermap.org

15. OER Impact Map: Maps
oermap.org
• Country Summary Map - evidence nodes organized by country
• OER Project Map - OER initiatives and projects around the world
• OER Evidence Map - all impact evidence is categorized according to the OER
Research Hub hypotheses
• OER Policy Map is the single largest curated collection of OER policies
• OER Impact Map aggregates the other maps
• Tweetmaps show a geographical summary of tweets for a particular Twitter
hashtag. E.g. #oermap for outreach; #oerrhub for tracking project activity.
• Maps by others

16. OER Impact Map: Maps
oermap.org
• Country Summary Map - evidence nodes organized by country
• OER Project Map - OER initiatives and projects around the world
• OER Evidence Map - all impact evidence is categorized according to the OER
Research Hub hypotheses
• OER Policy Map is the single largest curated collection of OER policies
• OER Impact Map aggregates the other maps
• Tweetmaps show a geographical summary of tweets for a particular Twitter
hashtag. E.g. #oermap for outreach; #oerrhub for tracking project activity.
• Maps by others

17. OER Policy Map
oermap.org/policy-map/

18. Methodology
OER Policy Map aggregates data from various places, including:
• CC Open Policy Network
• POERUP Wiki
• SPARC ‘Policies and Projects’
• OER Advocacy email list
Since there’s a lot of inaccurate data about OER policy, map data is hand curated to
increase accuracy. Only current or existing policies are included – not those which
have only been proposed.
Data may be filtered according to scope/forum and/or educational sector. Policies
need not result from pilots…

19. OER Policy Map uses
custom Wordpress
entries to aggregate data
about policies in support
of open education

20. L
R
N
I
Local/Institutional policies
Regional policies
National policies
International policies

21. OER Policy Map
Highlights

22. • Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002)
• UNESCO Forum on Open Courseware (2002)
• UNESCO International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) & Global OER
Community (2005)
• Cape Town Open Education Declaration (2007)
• Dakar Declaration on OER (2009)
• Commonwealth of Learning/UNESCO Guidelines on OER in HE (2011)
• 2012 OER Paris Declaration
International OER policy: milestones

23. in service of The Open University

24. National OER Policies (Europe)
• Cyfrowa szkoła (Digital School, Poland)
• Digital School, Greece
• El Centro Nacional de Desarrollo Curricular en Sistemas no Propietarios
(CeDeC) Spain
• Finnish National OER Strategy
• Flemish Ministry of Education and Training investment in OER
• Fundacja Orange (Orange Academy, Poland)
• JISC/HEA OER Programme

25. National OER Policies (Europe)
• Nasjonal digital læringsarena / Norwegian National Digital Learning Arena
• OER initiatives of the Portuguese Ministry of Education and Science
• OER Policy in Romania
• Wellcome Trust witholds grant payments for failure to publish openly
• Wikiwijs Repository, The Netherlands

26. in service of The Open University
Scottish Open Education Declaration
Open Scotland is a a voluntary cross sector initiative
led by Cetis, SQA, Jisc RSC Scotland and the ALT
Scotland SIG, which aims to raise awareness of open
education, encourage the sharing of OER, and
promote the development of open policy and practice.
The Scottish Open Education Declaration calls on the
Scottish Funding Council and Scottish Further and
Higher Education Institutions to endorse the following
principles:
• Promote access to learning through open
educational resources
• Support the adoption of open licenses
• Foster strategic open education alliances
• Support the development of user-friendly tools and
technologies
• Promote adoption of OER policy
R Regional policies

27. in service of The Open University
Wales Open Education Declaration of
Intent
This document drafted by the Vice-Chancellors of Higher
Education Wales represents their collective agreement: to
ensure that any designated teaching and learning material
released under open licence can be adapted and
redistributed without cost or restriction. Further language
supports the use of Open Educational Resources (OER),
"encouraging the introduction of open educational practice
into every part of the university."
R Regional policies
In Europe policies tend to be either institutional, national or
international (EU, UNESCO, etc.)

28. OER Policy in North America
In North America there are more ‘regional’ policies – decisions
are made at the state and district level.

29. North America
Canada
• BC Open Textbooks Project (2012)*
• MOU between Alberta, British Columbia and Saskatchewan (2014)*
• 19 Canadian institutional policies listed in ROAR (2014)
United States
• National Education Technology Plan (NETP) (2010)*
• Department of Labor (TAACCCT) Grant Program (2009)
• K-12: state, district, and school-based policies
*Are these actually ‘policies’? To discuss later

30. United States: K-12 overview
K-12 education devolved to individual states
• Discrete policy environments, different barriers
• Role of key individuals and funding
• Common Core curriculum stimulates interest, funding
Generally speaking…
• Most K-12 state ‘policies’ still removing barriers to usage
• Some state-led pilots/ initiatives progress without formal ‘policies’
• No one is succeeding without funding
• No one is succeeding without an ‘OER champion’

31. Prominent US K-12 OER
Utah
• Administrative rule (R277-111) enables CC-BY sharing (2009)
• Pilot (Open High School) + Policy (R277-111) + Champion (Wiley) + Funding
(Hewlett/state) = Open Textbooks in all high schools this year ($5 each)
Washington State
• Legislation (HB2337) establishes/funds K-12 open course library (2013)
• Pilots (many) + Policy (HB2337) + Champions (Green/Carlye/Nelson) + Funding
(state) =
• …too soon to tell

32. Other state-level US K-12 OER
Policies removing barriers to creation/uptake
• Maine requires information clearinghouse on online/open resources use, LD569 (2011)
• Virginia permits instructors to openly license materials, HB1941 (2009)
• W. Virginia permits open materials to be considered for curriculum SB631 (2010)
• Texas allows inclusion of OER on list of approved instructional materials HB2488 (2009)
• Minnesota requires a catalog of publicly available digital learning content, Chap. 273 (2012)
Initiatives driving creation/uptake
• California launches Free Digital Textbook Initiative to spur open textbook creation (2009)
• New York releases RFP for curriculum modules which must be released CC-BY (2011)
• Idaho vets, categorizes, ensures access to, and encourages use of OER (2012)
• Illinois is building ISLE IOER platform for accessing interoperable OER (2013)

33. South America and Asia
South America
• OER-Brazil: initiative (2008) but functions to stimulate others
• São Paulo, Brazil (municipal government): CC-BY (2011)
Asia
• Chinese Quality Open Course Project (2011)
• Indonesia Higher Education Law

34. • AUSGoal – Australian Governments Open Access and Licensing Framework
• OER commons for New Zealand Schools
• Kenya National OER Policy
• South African White Paper for Post-School Education and Training
National OER Policies (Rest of World)

35. No time to discuss at length but we can observe the following:
• Policies for institutional archiving of OER (examples)
• Policies that support open access
• Publicly funded = openly licensed?
• Statements of support that arguably fall short of policies
• Policies that make no specific recommendation in light of OER (e.g. improve
access to technology) – are these OER policies?
Local/Institutional Policies

36. Reframing the hypothesis…?

37. General Conclusions

38. Reflections
• There is little uniformity in the ways that policies come into being, though
challenges are more uniform
• There are many more examples of pilots not leading to policy change but these
are harder to evidence
• Policy and practice (pilots) often proceed hand in hand, each impacting the other
• Attempting to taxonomize policies challenges the underlying assumptions: e.g.
what is a policy? Must it mandate something? Must it be written as law?
• How are decisions made in practice - do policies matter?
• Is the ambiguity around OER policy a help or a hindrance?
• ‘Direct’ vs ‘indirect’ policy support for OER
• ‘Removing barriers’ vs ‘Driving OER’

39. Talking Points
What’s next for OER policy?

40. Talking Points
What would an ideal OER policy look
like in your institution?

41. Talking Points
Policies: top-down or bottom-up?

42. Talking Points
What’s missing from the map?

43. Talking Points
What does success look like for
OER?

44. We want to put you on the map!
So let us know about OER policy and
impact in your institution
Request an account to contribute and vote

45. Join us in building understanding
of open education

46. Thanks for listening!
oerresearchhub.org
oermap.org
rob.farrow@open.ac.uk / @philosopher1978
sara@salientresearch.net / @salientresearch

47. in service of The Open University