OER-Certification for Higher Education

Originally published in: Ebner, M. (2018). OER-Certification in Higher Education. In Proceedings of EdMedia: World Conference on Educational Media and Technology. pp. 1-6 Amsterdam, Netherlands: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE).

OER-Certification for Higher Education Martin Ebner Graz University of Technology, Department Educational Technology Austria [email protected] Abstract: Open Education Resources (OER) will play an important role in the future of higher education institutions at least in German-speaking countries. Due to the very strict copyright law OER seems to be the only possible solution in a long run. In this publication, we discuss the result of a nationwide special interest group (SIG) aiming to provide a nationwide strategy and solution for how higher education institutions can deal with this issue. A concept of OER certification will be presented, which is divided into two domains: The certification of the lecturers and the certification of the higher educations institutions themselves. In the end, the use of Open Badges is recommended as a certification method. The proposed concept can also be used by other institutions, independently of the education sector or the country.

Introduction In Central Europe, especially in German-speaking countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) the copyright law is very strict, in order to protect the rights of artists, musicians as well as authors (Ebner et al, 2016a). This law prohibits using content in any way, even for educational purposes, without an explicit permission of the copyright owner. In other words, the “fair use”-principle as used in the Unites States is simply not possible. It does not even matter whether the content itself was intended for educational usage or not. For example, imagine a lecturer who provides some handouts in their lecture to the students. Without an explicit permission, a student is not allowed to modify the document and share it amongst their classmates. The student is only able to use those documents in a “read-only” manner for their own private usage – any sharing, emailing or uploading to an information system is prohibited and can be punished with an arbitrarily amount of money. Therefore, the violation of the copyright law is not a trivial offence, in contrast the violator will be sued, which happens more frequently these days because of the digital possibilities to search the Internet for illegal use. It can be summarized that the main difference of the copyright in the US and for example Austria is, that in the US any content can be used for educational purposes according to the “fair use” principle and the author has to explicit protect their work if they want to prohibit this kind of usage. In Austria, any work is protected by the copyright law. One effect of this law is that teachers and students hide their work because they fear illegal usage of foreign content. There is just one small option to use other people’s works: citation. Even this option is of little assistance because citation means that only a small piece of the original work can be used. In contrast, Open Educational Resources (OER) represents exactly the opposite of this and are therefore often claimed as “copyleft” instead of copyright. Consequently, OER can be the solution in the long run to overcome the above mentioned problems. They are not only freely available, but also free to use. Every single resource is delivered with a license that explicitly states how the material can be used by both teachers and learners. “Open” in German- speaking Europe means that (Ebner & Schön, 2011): • it is available for free, • it is useable for free (it can be changed, remixed, printed ...), • it is possible to use and modify the material with freely available Open Source software and open formats (e.g. OpenOffice), and • it supports open teaching and learning processes. Copyleft means that, in case of OER, the license tells us anything can be done with content except for the defined restrictions For example the CC-BY (creative commons) license stands for a complete free usage as long as the original author is named. According to Geser (2007, p. 21), in addition to the core issue of the copyright law, OER has some further benefits:


OER offer a broader range of subjects and topics to choose from and allow for more flexibility in choosing material for teaching and learning. • OER leverage the educational value of resources by providing teachers with personal feedback, lessons learned and suggestions for improvements. • OER facilitate learning communities, such as groups of teachers and learners, with easy-to-use tools to set up collaborative learning environments. • OER promote user-centered approaches in education and lifelong learning. Users are not only consumers of educational content, but create own materials, develop e-portfolios and share study results and experiences with peers. Since the early days of the OER movement, different publications have pointed out why OER are highly relevant for higher education (Caswell et al., 2008; Hylen, 2006; Johnstone, 2005). Some early adopters described the necessity of OER-strategies for higher education institutions (Schaffert, 2010) and a first implementation in Austria can be found by Ebner & Stöckler-Penz (2011). •

OER Integration in Austrian Higher Education Based on the described situation there seems to be an urgent need for OER integration in Austrian higher education. Therefore, a special interest group (SIG) was founded in 2015 by a nation-wide association called “Forum Neue Medien in der Lehre Austria”, short for fnma. The aim of this SIG in the first run was to collect all OER initiatives and recommend how long term integration of OER in higher education is possible. The result was a report that strongly recommends the production of OER (Ebner et al, 2016b). Due to the fact that educational institutions, especially those in higher education, play a crucial role in the production of OER, the report advised to foster the production of a national strategy or at a least a national commitment to OER. Finally, the report introduced recommendations for the integration of OER in all higher education institutions in Austria. The cooperation among various stakeholders on different levels needs to be central to all further efforts, which should be based upon six explicit requirements (Ebner et al, 2016b): 1. Mandatory commitment to OER 2. Establishment of a nationwide information platform about OER for exchange and cooperation 3. Establishment of nationwide OER educational programs for different stakeholders 4. Establishment of national OER badges 5. Targeted financial and structural promotion of OER 6. Establishment of OER strategies within each institution and as a comprehensive approach The report closes with the statement that strategies will be necessary to be able to fully integrate OER in higher education institutions and a concept how this integration can be verified. Therefore, the SIG, in close cooperation with the federal ministry of science, continued working on a concept on how higher education institutions can be certified for their OER activities. In this publication we will try to answer the research question, how a concept for a nation wide OER-certification in higher education can look like.

Methodology – Baseline and Goal As described in the chapter “OER Integration in Austrian Higher Education” the SIG on OER recommended the integration of OER in higher education. Especially requirement six, concerning the “establishment of OER strategies”, as well as requirement 4 “Establishment of national OER badges”, still require more detailed work. Therefore, the SIG continues working on defining how those badges, which can be earned by reaching a defined level, should be distributed and followed the idea of a nation-wide central labeling service. It is very important to mention the SIG defined preconditions for the OER-labeling beforehand: • The goal of the labeling service is not to review the content of any OER objects. This has to be done by the lecturer or the university beforehand • The goal of the labeling service is also not a review with regards to copyright issues.


Both issues are impossible from the a financial, legal and organizational perspective. In contrast, the SIG follows the idea that both must be done by universities themselves and therefore, an education program for lecturers must be offered to ensure that the produced learning content can in the end be offered as Open Education Resource. The methodology of the SIG was to discuss possible concepts with different stakeholders (lecturers, responsible persons in higher education, federal ministry) to ensure different perspectives as well as possible practical solutions. Afterwards a first draft was written and heavily discussed. Finally, all perspectives were considered which led to the final concept.

OER-Certification for Austrian Higher Education Institutions The certification of OER is divided into two domains: First the certification of the lecturers and second the certification of the higher education institutions. A central nationwide office should be responsible for the certification. It is recommended that it consist of representatives of higher education institutions to ensure an objective assessment of the learning contents. Domain 1: OER-certification of lecturers The first domain is about the certification of lecturers, which should be done in a two-stage process: • Part 1: The first part is fulfilled if a lecturer has verifiably created and published a total of three OER-objects. • Part 2: For the second part, the lecturer must prove that they have completed an OER training. From part to level: The two-pronged procedure provides for two-stage certification: In order to reach level 1, one of the two parts has to be completed by the university lecturer. To achieve level 2, both parts must be verified. In other words, the lecturer submits an application for a certification to the central office on their own initiative, providing their proof of all relevant requirements. The personal certificates should be valid for all university lecturers. They remain valid even in if the employer (e. g. within the Austrian universities) changes and they therefore do not have an expiration date (valid for both level 1 and 2). The certificate is collected by the central office as well as distributed to the certified lecturer in the form of digital Open Badges. If a learning object has more than one author, the object is counted for each of them. In order to proved the created OERs, it is proposed to either store them in repositories offered by or designated as suitable by higher education institutions or to use an accredited platform (reported in a centralized register). The use of metadata for a more detailed description (as can be seen in the project Open Education Austria (http://www.openeducation.at)) is explicitly recommended. For the final license of the OER-object, a CC-0, CC-BY or CC-BY-SA license or a comparable free license must be used. The license has to be clearly visible within the learning object. The qualification measure required for Part 2 should be offered and carried out by all higher education institutions in a comparable form or at least with the same workload (in terms of the Bologna process). Within the framework of the project "Open Education Austria" (http://openeducation.at) a proposal was developed and tested. This can be seen as a possible example of a qualification measure: The proposal is based on a blended learning scenario and consist of a three-hour face-to-face-introductory workshop, a freely accessible online course (MOOC) of about ten hours' duration (Ebner et al, 2016a) and a final, in-depth workshop of six hours. Additionally further six hours of self-study are required. In total, there is thus a total workload of 25 hours or one European Credit (EC). For the completion of Part 2, therefore, a qualification measure to the extent of one European Credit (in total a workload of 25 working hours) is generally proposed. The form in which the qualification measures are carried out is entirely up to the respective educational institution. Therefore, the confirmation of completion of the quality-assured qualification measure or any other recognition (e. g. of accredited further training courses which are already available) must be provided by the respective educational institution.


Domain 2: OER-certification of Higher Education institutions In addition to lecturers, higher education institutions should also receive (separate) certifications. The reason for this is to prove that the higher education institution has sufficient experience and competences in the field of Open Educational Resources. This should on the one hand be demonstrated by a sufficient number of lecturers who own an OER certificate and on the other hand by further training measures as well as an adequate infrastructure. The strategic anchoring of OER should also be given in the form of a separate OER strategy. In this case, the certification takes the form of a three-part concept: • Part 1: The higher education institution has a corresponding OER-qualification-measure (training) and publicly commits itself strategically to using Open Educational Resources. • Part 2: The higher education institution has a defined number of OER-certified level 2 lecturers. • Part 3: The higher education institution offers its own repository (or a suitable joint solution in cooperation with other universities) for its lecturers in which OER-objects can be stored. From part to level: Only one of the three parts must be provided by the higher education institution in order to achieve level 1. To achieve level 2, two of the three parts must be verified and to achieve level 3, all three parts must be verified. The university applies for certification independently from the central office by providing proof of the corresponding prerequisites. The issued certificate is valid for a period of three years and will then be re-evaluated accordingly. If a new stage is reached in the meantime, the term begins anew with the submission of the new stage. The certificate is also issued as a digital Open Badge and archived by the central office. The number of OER-certified level 2 lecturers required is determined by the number of students and is defined as follows: • Higher education institution with a total of less than 1000 students: 5 certified lecturers • Higher education institution with 1000 - 3000 students: 10 certified lecturers • Higher education institution with 3000 - 5000 students: 20 certified lecturers • Higher education institution with >5000 students: 40 certified lecturers

Open Badges for certification In order to make the certification possible or to use the power of digitalization, it is suggested to use an innovative implementation: the use of Open Badges. In the past, public skills were identified by physical insignia such as patches on the sashes of scouts, or individual awards on paramedic medals. Nowadays, the term "badge" was and is used here. These visual and virtual representations (image files) of skills, relationships and interests are accessible or representable online. In Open Badges, metadata is stored that provides evidence of context, meaning and performance to achieve this distinction. Open Badges are verifiable, portable and digital badges that are standardized (i. e. have a uniform specification; currently version 2.0) and have an associated digital ecosystem (Open Badges Ecosystem; OBE). This environment was developed and designed by the Mozilla Foundation and funded by the MacArthur Foundation (Goligoski, 2012). Since 1st January 2017, the IMS Global Learning Consortium has been supporting and developing the project. In addition to the technical components, the digital ecosystem consists of at least four roles: • Issuer: defines, awards, verifies and maintains the issued badges. • Recipient/user: receives a unique badge for the performed tasks and is clearly identifiable. • Platform/Displayer: Software application used to display and share the badges. • Viewer: Person who is interested in the acquired skills of the badge holder (e. g. new employer, non-profit organization). A central office with the following general tasks should assume the role of the issuer, which should be adapted in accordance with the proposed cornerstones of the certification: • Definition of general goals to be represented by the Open Badges. • Decide which specific skill/skill is awarded with Open Badge.


• • • •

Design of the Open Badges and definition of the associated metadata. Publication of a digital artifact that provides general information on how to obtain an Open Badge and a profile of the organization providing the service. Generation of Open Badges as well as their verification. Delivery of Open Badges to the recipients.

In order to be able to make this service of issuing Open Badges available, the issuer can fall back on parts of the Open Badges Ecosystem or, if necessary, develop its own application. The minimum requirement for creating one’s own service is a web server to make files publicly accessible. In addition to the tasks mentioned above, the following functional requirements must be applied to the system: • • •

Definition of the desired functionality within an information system. Website on which additional information about the objectives and concerns of the central office can be found. Definition of metadata of the OER that allow a more detailed description. These can then be written directly into the Open Badge in the form of an extension.

Finally, it is recommended that the information system also meets the following non-functional requirements: • It should be Open Source based • Part of a large developer community • There are various reusable extensions/modules/plugins available for • Have the necessary support for a long-term maintenance of the system A corresponding content management system, such as TYPO3 (Lorenz et al, 2013), provides a solution for all these requirements with regard to the allocation of badges. Such a web application allows creating, editing and organizing different content. The names of the certified lecturers and higher education institutions, links to repositories and thus existing Open Educational Resources as well as information on OER and the certification itself are to be made available there in a collected form.

Discussion and Conclusion In general, it should be noted that, apart from higher education institutions, the OER certification in general should also be possible for other Austrian educational institutions and their employed staff. However, the procedure to be followed in this regard must be clarified separately with the respective educational institutions. The SIG explicitly suggests that the implementation of the presented concept can only be implemented with appropriate financial support by the federal ministry (so it is also a political issue), since on the one hand the establishment of a central office is connected with corresponding (personnel) resources and on the other hand it also requires support from the higher education institutions in order to establish the further training accordingly. It should also be pointed out that further support must be provided in as well as between universities. This includes, for example, support in the creation of OER strategies, in the exchange of information on qualification measures or in passing on templates. The current cooperation project "Open Education Austria" is worth mentioning here, which is already carrying out preparatory work in this direction (http://www.openeducation.at; last visited in January 2018). In addition, the long-term creation of an appropriate infrastructure (see OANA, 2016) is also necessary, not only so lecturers can store their OER-licensed objects there, but also that they can be incorporated into a searchable and thus retrievable IT-structure. In the long run, it is essential to ensure an infrastructure operating across institutions (e. g. project e-Infrastructure-Austria (https://www.e-infrastructures.at/)). Finally, it can be concluded that these concept serves as bases for further steps on a nationwide OERcertification in the area of higher education. From our perspective, this can be an essential first step to foster the


production of OER within higher education institutions, their distribution amongst different lecturers and of course their reuse aiming to create a more flexible learning behavior of tomorrow’s society.

Acknowledgements I would like to express my gratitude to the people who were part of the SIG and worked me with me on the recommendations, namely Paul Budroni, Victoria Buschbeck, Asura Enkhbayar, Andreas Ferus, Christian F. Freisleben-Teutscher, Ortrun Gröblinger, Robert Hafner, Michael Kopp, Ina Matt, Sabine Ofner, Felix Schmitt, Sandra Schön, Maria Seissl, Peter Seitz, Elisabeth Skokan, Eva Vogt, Daniela Waller and Charlotte Zwiauer. Finally I am equally indebted to Maria Haas for her assistance during writing this publication.

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