The Evolution of Openness in HE
Some are mooting concerns that open education is taking a step backwards (Rutter, 2019). MOOCs have rapidly become monetised, and more and more closed. Pearson are looking to address the high cost of textbooks by introducing a Netflix-style subscription model. And, as noted by my colleague, Nick Savage, high quality, relevant Open Education Resources are still hard to find and adapt. How did we get here? Where are we now and what does the future hold? What is the role of the University as content becomes increasingly commoditised? Looking back at the roots of ‘open’, we can see that technology has been a key driving force in its development. By looking at the current state of open education and emerging technology, can we gain an insight into what the future may hold and how HE institutions could position themselves to take advantage?
The Development of Open Education in HE
So, where did ‘open’ come from and how and why did it become applied to educational resources?
According to Conole and Brown (2018) ”one of the key and most commonly accepted affordances of digital technologies is that they enable more open practices.“
Indeed, the concept of ’open’ as we know it in today’s digital world originated in the context of software. Universities were early adopters of computers in the 1950s and 60s. Academics and commercial researchers worked together to produce computer programs that were often released into the public domain, consistent with academic knowledge sharing practices (Wikipedia, 2019).
The proliferation of computing led to the commercialisation of software. Enterprises wanted to protect their intellectual property from being used without license. They ceased to distribute software in its ‘source code’ form and instead compiled it into ‘black box’ executable files. The original source code could neither be seen nor modified. In 1983, Richard Stallman, frustrated with this situation, founded the GNU Corporation, to allow free dissemination of his source code. Stallman had previously worked on a community-developed computer operating system. His argument was that computer programs are like recipes, you use, them, adapt them to your needs and pass them on to others so that they can do the same. In 1985, Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation to support the free software movement. Organisations, such as the non-profit Apache Software Foundation, emerged who promoted and facilitated the communal development of free software. Other platforms, such as the popular GitHub followed. Free and open-source software now co-exists with proprietary software and many of us will use it in our work. This includes applications such as the Firefox internet browser, Linux operating systems, MySQL databases and moodle (an open-source alternative to Blackboard).
If knowledge sharing is indeed a fundamental academic principle, then this has been going on since the inception of universities. However, in terms of sharing educational materials openly online, front-runner MERLOT emerged from California State University in 1997, providing online access to learning and support materials and content creation tools. In 1999, David Wiley, proposed an open license for content and this was succeeded by the Creative Commons in 2001. In 2002 Hewlett Foundation’s Strategic Plan to Increase Access to High-Quality Educational Content was launched. The term Open Educational Resources (OER) was coined at a forum UNESCO forum in 2002. The Khan academy was introduced in 2006 and MOOCs began to emerge from 2008.
“Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning and research materials in any medium — digital or otherwise — that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.” (UNESCO, 2019).
The use of OERs has grown exponentially over recent years (Lin, 2019). Various factors are cited as drivers for this: the rise in computing, the internet and associated technologies, the increasing cost of textbooks, tuition fees and the cost of living (Blumenstyk, 2015).
Downes (2019) contends that, in line with web 1.0, OERs initially focussed on the content itself. As the web evolved into more of a social entity, some OERs came to be more about social interaction and collaboration (for example connectivist-style cMOOCs).
It has also been recognised that open resources require a set of open practices to flourish. Open Educational Practices (OEP) are defined as:
“The use of open educational resources with the aim to improve quality of educational processes and innovate educational environments.” (Ehlers and Conole, 2010)
Ehlers and Conole suggest that there are three stages of open in an organisation: Stage one is disparate silos of OER creation and use; stage two is a strategic organisation-wide approach where OER is used to improve learning within the organisation and stage three involves open educational practices which include learner generated content and peer quality review procedures to validate content within and between organisations.
I’d suggest that the University of Manchester (UoM) is generally on stage one of this continuum with a long way to go — as noted by my colleague, Ewan Chamings in Time to promote an OER Policy at UoM?
Despite the growth in the use of OER, there is still widespread dissatisfaction, particularly around the issue of finding good quality resources that are fit for context (Savage, 2018).
There are still significant barriers to the widespread uptake of OERs. It’s an unknown territory to many tutors, there’s a lack of institutional support to adapt and create OER and a lack of assessments indicating their quality (Lin, 2019). It can be difficult to re-purpose OER for your context, the embedded pedagogies may not be clear and academics may want to create their own resources and be reluctant to share their work. (Conole & Brown, 2018).
The Current Landscape in HE and Impact on Open Education
So, how has the HE context developed in this time period?
There has been a rapid growth in student numbers since the late 1980s, driven by factors such as the Robbins report, which led to the mass expansion of HE in the UK (Willetts, 2013). There are now more universities than ever before, competing for funding from a finite number of students. This has led to a competitive environment where content and intellectual property are defended as key assets. This can reduce opportunities for cross-university collaboration and may threaten the core principle of knowledge sharing and advancement. Whilst the wish to collaborate and further knowledge still appears strong, there is less appetite for sharing resources without recompense or copyright restrictions. Certainly at UoM, there does not appear to be high-level support for loosening copyright restrictions, with no OER policy and all teaching materials being copyright of the University (UoM Intellectual Property Policy, 2015).
The development of MOOCs over the past 10 years can be seen as an example of the reluctance to share resources without recompense. MOOCs were a significant innovation in education, driven by technology (Conole & Brown, 2018). Initially all MOOCs were free of charge (Shah, 2018). The early cMOOCs started off in Downes’ aforementioned vision of an innovation driven by web 2.0, by interaction and collaboration. The big players, however, (Coursera, edX) were focussed on more traditional, didactic, individualistically-cognitive pedagogy, although with interactions afforded by technology. Now, the predominant model for the major MOOC platforms is to attract users with free content and then to charge for certificates, microcredentials, university credit, degrees and corporate subscriptions (Pickard, 2019).
Certainly it seems as though there is little appetite for making packaged courses available for free.
In recent years, the introduction of student loans and tuition fees have transferred more of the cost of education to students. This has led to students looking to maximise the value of what they get for their money, comparing universities and taking an increasingly consumerist approach to education. Student feedback plays a larger part in the assessment of Universities through initiatives such as the Teaching Excellence Framework, which uses feedback from the National Student Survey. As noted, cost pressures on students can increase their use of OER, particularly in the area of textbooks.
Technology is also driving new innovations which are starting to have a major impact on HE. Digitisation has led to the emergence of huge companies hosting electronic platforms to match services and providers in fields such as taxis (Uber), holiday lets (Airbnb) and TV (Netflix). The platforms have transformed the industries they operate in, enabling individual taxi drivers and individual house owners to tap into centrally organised and marketed systems. Netflix have changed the way we view TV. The on-demand service and subscription model mean we pay a monthly subscription for the right to watch all of the content they have available. This digitisation is starting to have an impact on HE. Recently, Pearson have moved to a Netflix-style subscription model for textbooks in the US. This is in answer to the competing Amazon textbook rental service as well as freely available online materials and piracy. Students pay a monthly subscription for access to textbooks available on the service. This may well reduce student costs in the short term. It may well protect the revenue from textbooks for publishers. However, the recent proliferation of platforms in the TV industry, with content providers such as Disney and Starz setting up their own monthly subscription platforms, means that costs for viewers who want access to everything are set to rise. Could this development be mirrored in the textbook industry too, raising costs again for students?
The Future
Given the significant barriers to the adoption of OER and OEP, are there some key technologies emerging that may influence the situation? What does the future hold for open in higher education?
Education commentator, Steven Mintz (2019), asserts that we know what doesn’t work in online learning — “Passive spectatorship, lack of structure and scaffolding, the absence of genuine interaction and personalized feedback, and services tailored for full-time residential students”. He further argues that “the explosion of information resources (much of it open and digital) increasingly requires a course design process that is collaborative” (cited in Hazlett, 2014).
Downes (2019) is in agreement. One of the technologies he sees as driving open education in future is a collaborative process for creating content using tools like GitHub. It would certainly be welcomed by my colleague Nick Savage, who yearns for a GitHub for OER. Downes argues, that under such a collaborative creation process, “licensing fades into the background”. I’m not certain that will be the case. But it does strike me that collaborative creation of OERs appears akin to the Apache Software Foundation model of open software development. But why has the open source software development model not been applied to higher education yet? Downes acknowledges, and I agree, that there is a massive learning curve to adopt the processes and technologies of collaborative development. More than that, I think it is a question of organisation and motivation. Developing open source software builds an individual’s coding skills, prepares them for working in a development team and adds gravitas to their CV. If we want people to work together on collaborative development of OERs, the benefits have to be recognised and rewarded. Maybe we need independent, not-for-profit organisations who host OER development platforms and provide structure and rules of engagement. Of course, this assumes that HE institutions not only allow it, but support it financially. Not for profit software foundations, like Apache (and Eclipse, Linux, Mozilla) are possible through the contributions of companies, both through allowing employees to work on projects and through direct corporate sponsorship. Contributing organisations reap the benefits in terms of the resources that are available to them, which are much richer and more valuable than if everyone worked in silos re-doing the same type of resource. Mintz (2019) advocates that Universities should make campus developed tools openly available to non-profits. I’d argue much, much more is needed.
Another emergent technology of interest is blockchain. Originating in the sphere of online currency (bitcoin), Blockchain enables information to be securely distributed over a number of computers. This decentralisation allows everyone to see the information therein and provides an auditable record for accountability (Blockgeeks, 2019). Blockchain is a simple way to pass information at no cost and thus could disrupt the business model of internet platforms that charge for a centralised ‘matching’ service (Airbnb, Uber, Netflix) (Blockgeeks, 2019). Blockchain could make it significantly easier to share OERs and also to ensure accreditation is maintained throughout the adaptation process. Blockchain could also improve the quality process through peer ranking and reviews. It could have a wide-ranging impact for academic publishing too. It would be prudent for universities to consider this technology’s impact on educational content sooner rather than later to try to get ahead of the game, leverage blockchain and rely less on commercial companies, like Pearson and Springer, as central points of distribution for books and papers.
The Open Data movement could also have a significant impact on educational resources (Downes, 2019). Open data can be fed into OERs to make them relevant to current, real-life contexts. As an example, our department recently looked into creating a merchandising simulation for fashion students which used real industry data and engaged them in planning which products buy and in what quantities. This software would emulate what merchandisers do in their work. Integrating open data into OERs could make them more relevant to their specific context of use in the workplace.
Artificial intelligence (AI), is already starting to have an impact on education. Commercial publishing company Springer has started using AI to automatically produce textbooks. Downes (2019) suggests that open artificial intelligence algorithms could be used in the search for appropriate OERs and identifies one service that aims to automate the production of OER courses (X5GON). AI can gather analytical data and apply it in order to personalise learning resources according to contextual variables.
Mintz advocates disaggregating some instructional content, which reminds me of my colleague, Ewan Chamings (2018) assertion that, to collaborate in the open, we need to break resources down into smaller parts than modules or courses. Downes (2019) argues that we need to change our approaches to content. Not seeing it in terms of courses, chapters and modules but instead in terms of data and context. Resources should be constantly changing to reflect fast-changing contexts. Again, to do this we need cross-institution collaboration.
Thus we can see that emerging open technologies can specifically address barriers to OERs including collaborative development, quality control, distribution, finding and aggregating relevant resources, personalisation and relevance to changing contexts and the workplace.
It appears to be a pivotal point for open education resources - awareness and adoption levels are better than ever. It’s time to move onto the next stage, leveraging the latest technology advances to further democratise access and contribution to open educational resources and practices. This is demonstrated by the Hewlett foundation’s (2019) recent announcement that they are developing a new strategy that goes beyond promoting awareness and adoption and addresses ‘how open education can engage learners with different experiences, needs, and interests’. The future could be good for open educational resources in higher education, but it is still ultimately dependent on the vision of university leaders and strategists to see the benefits and lay the groundwork. Emerging open technologies such as blockchain, open data and AI can be embraced and supported in an open educational strategy that aims to keep content out of the hands of commercial third-party platforms and bring it into a collaborative open infrastructure that promotes, facilitates and rewards co-creation of better educational resources. Competitive advantage in teaching then comes from the pedagogical approaches surrounding these resources, the aggregation of resources and pedagogy into a coherent whole. Not from the content in itself.
