Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Meeting Intercontinental Hotel, Nairobi 19 th March, 2009 OER Africa Possible Role in Agriculture OER for Africa

AgriOER Shared Vision To ultimately impact welfare and health of farmers in Africa  through sustainably empowering MSc students and graduates of African institutions to achieve change in agriculture  by leveraging African knowledge using OER processes and products that are integrated into universities and the global knowledge pool Objectives:  MSc curriculum  Improved learning outcomes  Research engagement  Sustaining the effort  Performance  Unlock local knowledge  Unlock global knowledge pool Farmers MSc Students and Graduates MSc Curriculum (Institutions, policies, Faculty,) discoverability

A Vision for Higher Education in Africa:  Vibrant, sustainable  Vibrant, sustainable African higher education institutions that play a critical role in building and sustaining African societies and economies, by producing the continent’s future intellectual leaders through free and open development and sharing of common intellectual capital. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 3 18th March, 2009

Measures of Success T ARGETS - A NNUAL & O VER T HREE Y EARS annual  The AgriOER Project objectives are successfully attained (annual)  All new/adapted OER produced through these collaborations are published on the OER Africa website, and the meta-data is shared with at least 3 major global OER repositories. agreed with institutions  Numbers of students enrolled in programs and courses using OER (agreed with institutions) each year o  At least 5 processes of institutional engagement to be completed during each year of implementation of the project  Availability and use of quality OER via OER Africa website and global OER repositories (including use of African OER in other parts of the world)

 Initial sensitization and initial exploration with senior management. Where interest is expressed at either Faculty or institutional levels we then initiate this process:  Participating institutions assemble and supply policy documentation ( intellectual property / ownership; materials development and curriculum design; faculty support, recognition, promotion and remuneration; content standards and quality assurance; technology/infrastructure; and financial support and sustainability.)  OER Africa analyses the above documentation to determine the extent to which it supports or impedes institutions in their quest to systematically harness OER. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 5 18th March, 2009 Insitutional Policy Engagement

 Based on this analysis, OER Africa works with the institution to plan processes to enhance the policy environment in such areas as:  Institutional/faculty support and recognition for investment of time in OER creation, adaptation, and use;  Intellectual property issues;  Policy constraints regarding localization, adaptation, and translation of materials;  Technology/infrastructure policies and strategies;  Content standards and quality assurance;  Financial support and sustainability. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 6 18th March, 2009 Insitutional Policy Engagement (2)

 Heighten institutional awareness of the above issues relevant to the proposed process of collaborative development and sharing of materials.  Draw out and address possible reasons for resistance from faculty and administration to the proposed process of collaborative development and sharing of materials.  Introduce the concept of how increased availability of OER-based learning materials can facilitate a longer-term, more learner-centred approach to education.  Work with institutions to turn the results of these focused processes into policy amendments that are responsive to their needs and create educationally and financially sustainable models for development, adaptation, and use of OER in African higher education. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 7 18th March, 2009 Objectives of Policy Engagement

2. Development/Adaptation of OER for Higher Education Courses and Programmes  Support to RUFORUM institutions as relevant, e.g. :  Supporting initial design and planning of the proposed development process;  Assisting institutions / faculties to complete audits of their materials in order to catalogue their intellectual property and the copyright conditions governing those materials;  Providing ongoing guidance regarding licensing issues;  Searching global repositories and other appropriate sources for potentially relevant materials once the curriculum focus for the project is defined; Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 8 18th March, 2009 Proposed Contribution (2)

 Targeting the global OER ‘movement’ to make requests for materials to broaden the above searches on behalf of African universities;  Managing materials development/adaptation processes where required in order to ensure high quality of the resulting materials;  Supplying instructional design expertise to support the process as appropriate; most often found to be useful when such processes involve collaboration between two or more higher education institutions  Providing management support to materials development processes where this is required ( most often found to be useful when such processes involve collaboration between two or more higher education institutions );  Assisting with generation of meta-data for OER produced (whether new or adapted) in order to support accessibility; and  Using the OER Africa platform to make OER produced in Africa accessible to the global OER community. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 9 18th March, 2009 Development / Adaptation of OER (2)

3. Other Support – As Required / Requested  Supporting RUFORUM in running sensitization and awareness- raising activities amongst its members to deepen commitment to OER across the network;  Facilitating processes to design collaborative OER projects with RUFORUM;  Managing collaborative projects in the field of OER, where this is requested by the network; OER Africa website  Assisting RUFORUM members to harness existing platforms such as Connexions and wiki-educator to ensure that they add practical value to the work of the Network, as well as providing online tools for collaboration and sharing through the OER Africa website; and  Providing other forms of support as appropriate to help to ensure the success and sustainability of the network. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 10 18th March, 2009 Proposed Contribution (3)

Collaboration with others in the Group  Willing and able to collaborate with all – just need some clarity on who comprises the group;  Collaboration will be directed by needs of participating HEIs / Faculties. Other Resources Being Leveraged  Seed Funding from Hewlett Foundation  Relationships arising from other ongoing processes  Institutional content developers  Ongoing research into OER concepts and practice in Africa:  Financially and educationally sustainable models for development, adaptation and use of OER in African higher education institutions;  Online discussions leading to research papers on key topics (e.g. remuneration), and;  Research into possible differences in the uptake and effect of OER in different subject domain areas. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 11 18th March, 2009 Project Sustainability

Bottom Line  Project/s are deemed relevant by the participating institutions;  Project/s are integrated into institutional processes – not something on the side;  Capacity building and financial resources are provided to participating institutions to enable their meaningful participation;  Project Monitoring and Reporting is done in such a way as to feed into improving project implementation;  Project Evaluation is positive – i.e. that tangible contributions have been made to the Vision;  The above is publicised so that the network grows and funding partners (govt, foundations, etc.) are aware and interested. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 12 18th March, 2009 Project Sustainability

OER Africa Partner Network Collaborative networks via OER domain-focused approach:  Health OER;  ACDE Working Group on Collaboration;  Various SAIDE projects. Via the OER Africa website host to the following CoPs:  ACEMaths ACEMaths  HEALTH OER HEALTH OER  PHEA-ETI PHEA-ETI  Skills for a Changing World Skills for a Changing World  OER Africa Research Space OER Africa Research Space  Meta-data federated with global OER repositories, thereby creating greater visibility for African-created OER. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 13 18th March, 2009

OER Africa Partner Network (2) Use of existing Platforms: Face Book  Health OER Group on Face Book with wiki-educator  Ongoing discussions with wiki-educator regarding the possibility of a financial space within this project (AgriOER) for site visits to African universities to introduce the platform and build capacity to harness wikis to support collaborative OER development. Connexions.  Ongoing discussions re development of a methodology for publishing resources produced in Africa and generated in local IT systems, into global repositories such as Connexions. Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 14 18th March, 2009

Personnel  Institutional content developers (institutional grants)  OER Africa CoP Facilitator / Content Development  Instructional Designer  Technical Consultant  Graphic designer Gates Foundation Meeting - Agriculture OER for Africa 15 18th March, 2009 Possible Roles & Tasks Requiring Funding Travel & workshops  Inter-African Air Travel (economy)  Local Accommodation and Subsistence  International tele-conference Without a clear schedule of activities and committed institutions, too soon to generate a budget. The following are possible allocations: Extraordinary items  OER Africa website hosting/bandwidth cost  Development and testing of technical standards for content importing and exporting to facilitate publications of OER in the OER Africa website into Connexions.

Thank you Catherine Ngugi Project Director

For tomorrow:  How you contribute to the vision – exactly – what is YOUR objective  Your measures of success and impact – impact on the vision  What are your 3-year targets?:  Describe your implementation process include technologies.  Describe your partner network (external to this group)  Other resources you are leveraging  Financial sustainability  In what ways will you link to or collaborate with others in this group.  What are your gaps? What do you need to succeed?  Roles and tasks you need funded