1. Page 1 A Service for Knowledge Sharing Wien, 2003-10-07 The Universal Consortium universal@educanext.org http://www.educanext.org/

2. Page 2 The Vision of Sharing Knowledge “The whole power of science is the power of shared ideas.” (Paul Jones) “Universities generate content every day through their courses and seminars. Then they throw it away.“ (Dennis Tsichritzis) “Every knowledge-based organization – law firm, hospital, or professional services firm – wastes time, money and human energy recreating intellectual assets.“ (Thomas H. Davenport) - Some thoughts of distinguished professors -

3. Page 3 EducaNext is a multilingual, academic exchange portal, where members of higher education, research organisations, and professional communities can go to share, retrieve, and reuse learning resources. What is EducaNext?

4. Page 4 The primary mission of EducaNext is:  to serve and support all individuals in the academic community  who are dedicated to increasing the excellence of higher education and research  through distributed collaboration The Mission

5. Page 5 Sharing knowledge resources requires us to establish a “culture of share and re-use“  EducaNext Code of Behaviour Quality of content is a critical success factor  Quality Management Processes Providers want to control the usage of their resources  Community Management Features Providers want to stay informed about the usage of their resources  Booking concept High usability of tools is important  Open development, usability testing, … Design Assumptions of the Service:

6. Page 6 Educational materials: electronic textbooks, recorded lectures, presentations, lecture notes, case studies, quizzes, etc Educational activities: distributed course, lectures, tutoring sessions, etc. Additional Knowledge Resources (future): Collaborative content production projects, forum, research papers, integrated informal knowledge, etc. Types of Knowledge Resources

7. Page 7 Examples

8. Page 8 EducaNext Exchange Environment

9. Page 9 Providers can offer under the following licenses: 1.Free distribution: Allows copy, distribution, modification,... Original author must be given credit 2.Free distribution for academic purposes: Similar to “free distribution”, except that commercial distribution is not allowed 3.Free distribution for academic purposes, modifications not allowed 4.Customised license Defined by provider EducaNext licences for distributing content:

10. Page 10  Quality Management Processes have been incorporated in EducaNext Peer review Evaluation engine Quality content discussion forum Evaluation by portal management Quality Management Quality of content is a critical success factor

11. Page 11 allowing the interworking with existing delivery systems, such as: Videoconferencing applications LMS (Learning Management Systems) Video servers Web servers EducaNext supports various delivery systems EducaNext has an open architecture

12. Page 12 Universal Brokerage Platform Content Delivery system (e.g. Learning Management System) Metadata Learning resource Any Content Delivery system (e.g. Web server, Streaming Server, Video Conferencing Tool) Provider PC Provider system System interface Open System Architecture for Material

13. Page 13 4. Consumption Delivery system for live educational activities (e.gISABEL) 2. Provision UNIVERSAL Brokerage Platform 1. Announce- ment 3. Booking 4. Consumption Open System Architecture for Live Activities Design goal: learning resource announcement and access control.

14. Page 14 System Interface Framework

15. Page 15 IMS Vendors and IT Companies –Allweb (Greece) –Campus of Europe (France) –IMC (Germany) –BearingPoint Infonova, formerly KPMG Infonova (Austria) Consortia –IST project ELENA (12+2 institutions), http://www.elena-project.org/ –Ten-A, http://www.ten-a.org/ –UNIVERSAL (17+1 institutions), http://www.ist-universal.org/ Standardization Bodies –CEN/ISSS: Joint ARIADNE/UNIVERSAL proposal for work item called “Interoperability of Repositories for Learning” –First contacts with “Digital Repository Interoperability” group of the IMS Supporters of System Interface Framework

16. Page 16 EducaNext is a free and open service for –all members of the academic community EducaNext community A member of the EducaNext community register user –Must be a register user Code of Behaviour –Accepts the “Code of Behaviour” of EducaNext –Commits to a fair exchange of knowledge EducaNext community The EducaNext community all registered users –Formed by all registered users –Only registered users can Offer resources Participate in sub-communities The EducaNext User Community

17. Page 17 EducaNext supports various types of –Knowledge communities Open communities Closed communities A community manager moderates each community –Any registered user can moderate a community Knowledge communities allow experts –To exchange resources in a controlled environment Knowledge Communities

18. Page 18 EducaNext Community –Formed by all registered users Steering Committee –Initially created by a group of promoters –Ellected by EducaNext Community after creation Executive Board –Appointed by Steering Committee EducaNext Organisation

19. Page 19 Steering Committee –Prof. Juan Quemada (Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, ES), chair –Prof. Spyros Amourgis (Hellenic Open University, GR) –Prof. Nicolas Balacheff (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, FR) –Prof. Borka Jerman-Blazic (Jozef Stefan Institute, SI) –Prof. Erik Duval (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, BE) –Prof. Ebba Thora Hvannberg (University of Iceland, IS) –Prof. Michel Klein (Hautes Etudes Commerciales, FR) –Prof. Wolfgang Nejdl (Learning Lab Lower Saxony, DE) –Prof. Gustaf Neumann (Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, AT) –Prof. Bernhard Plattner (Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, CH) –Prof. Zbigniew Turowski (Warsaw University of Technology, PL) Who is behind EducaNext?

20. Page 20 Service Management / Internal Coordination  Juan Q., Bernd S., Christian K., Tapio K. Portal Administration: Management of Portal  Olivier C., Oleg V., Quality Control (of Content, Communities, and Communication):  Effie L., Tomaz K., Lampros S., Sigrun G. Communication, Image, Dissemination:  Katherine M., Gregoire B., Vana K., Michel K., Software Development:  Stefan B., Thomas Z., Reinhold L.,  New Collaborators? Steering Committee Executive Board Status Quo of Executive Board

21. Page 21 Usability & proper functionality is critical for success –EducaNext service –Delivery systems and tools –Collaboration tools Software must be maintained and evolved –To correct bugs, malfunction –Improve usability, functionality –Demanded new state of the art components must be added Today’s software production/maintenance –Collaborative Software Project between EducaNext members Future: Open software project? Software Management

22. Page 22 Universal Brokerage Platform @ Austrian Education Portal

23. Page 23 Universal Brokerage Platform @ CEMS

24. Page 24 Additional Slides

25. Page 25 Universal Brokerage Platform @ EducaNext

26. Page 26 Registered members should follow the mission of EducaNext Registered members should make good use of EducaNext –Accurate information about knowledge resource (e.g., availability) should be provided –Members should only offer resources, which they have the legal right to offer –Proper acknowledgements of the original authors should be made, whenever resources acquired are reused –EducaNext should not be used for promoting political or religious ideas and interests “Code of Behaviour”

27. Page 27 Portal management Registration authority Community Manager Authenticated user Anonymous user Management Creation of communities Management of community Members of community Member of knowledge society Registration of users Provision and/or Consumption of Learning Resources Access to public Learning Resources; Catalogue browsing Find funding & manage services (business and technical) Monitor communities; enforce Code of Behaviour Monitor users; enforce Code of Behaviour Follow the rules of the community and Code of Behaviour No misuse Title RoleRightsResponsibilities Creation of Registration Authorities Creation of Comm. Registration of users Roles, Rights and Responsibilities

28. Page 28 The Universal Brokerage Platform is a distributed web-application supporting the exchange of knowledge resources IT Challenge successfully tackled: Business model neutral To interface with heterogeneous content delivery systems such as Web servers, Streaming media servers, Videoconference systems, and Learning Management Systems The Tool: Universal Brokerage Platform

29. Page 29 Interoperability with various systems

30. Page 30 Funding Period: April 2000 - July 2003 Who is involved? RWTH Aachen (De) BearingPoint Infonova (At) BIT: Bureau for International Research and Technology Cooperation (At) Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (Ch) Hautes Etudes Commerciales (Fr) Hellenic Open University (Gr) Helsinki University of Technology (Fi) Iceland Telecom (Is) Institut Jozef Stefan (Si) Institut National des Télécommunications (INT, Fr) NCSR Demokritos (Gr) T-Nova Deutsche Telekom Innovationsgesellschaft mbH (De) Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (Es) Université Libre de Bruxelles (Be) University of Cyprus (Cy) University of Lancaster (Uk) Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien (At) Warsaw University of Technology (Pl) The UNIVERSAL IST Project

31. Page 31 EducaNext: The Service for sharing learning resources among faculty members in higher education and research institutions Universal Brokerage Platform (UBP): The Technology for building infrastructures for knowledge sharing. Contributions of Universal

32. Page 32 Long tradition of knowledge sharing via academic journals and conferences („gift culture“) Knowledge sharing limited to research artefacts (no teaching artefacts) Increased demands for „professional“ teaching services in higher education (competition, evaluation, …) Transfer knowledge sharing efficiency from research to teaching In Europe appropriate infrastructures still in an infancy stage Status Quo of Knowledge Sharing in Higher Education and Research