Its nearly time for #OER16

I’ve really enjoyed working on the organisation for this year’s OER Conference. Along with my fellow OER16 committee members I think we have arranged a pretty special conference.

Its so rewarding being in a team of  people drawn from all across the spectrum of open education who give their time freely and willingly for the common good. I’ve found the open education community to be so friendly and supportive and I just love it.

I’m really excited to hear our keynote and invited speakers ..

• Jim Groom, Reclaim Hosting
• Catherine Cronin, National University of Ireland, Galway
• Emma Smith, University of Oxford
• John Scally, National Library for Scotland
• Melissa Highton, University of Edinburgh

and also there are so many parallel sessions that I am looking forward to that it is going to be a really, really hard choice to pick !

So if you are also heading to Edinburgh today for the… #OER16 Conference … (its not long now ) …I look forward to seeing you there ( you can however also participate virtually so I might just see you online ! )

I might also try and periscope a few bits and bobs so if you follow me on twitter watch out for the announcements …

 OER16 Open Culture

19th & 20th April 2016, University of Edinburgh, UK

The 7th Open Educational Resources Conference, OER16: Open Culture, will be held on the 19th-20th April 2016 at the University of Edinburgh.

The conference will be chaired by Melissa Highton, Director of Learning, Teaching and Web Services at the University of Edinburgh, and Lorna Campbell, OER Liaison at the University of Edinburgh and EDINA Digital Education Manager.

The vision for the conference is to focus on the value proposition of embedding open culture in the context of institutional strategies for learning, teaching and research focusing on:

• The strategic advantage of open and creating a culture of openness.
• Converging and competing cultures of open knowledge, open source, open content, open practice, open data and open access.
• Hacking, making and sharing.
• The reputational challenges of openwashing.
• Openness and public engagement.
• Innovative approaches to opening up cultural heritage collections for education.

The conference themes are:

1. Strategic and reputational advantages of openness (including, but not restricted to, outreach, public engagement and return on investment).
2. Converging or diverging cultures of openness (including open data, open science, open GLAM, open knowledge, open source, open content, open access).
3. Hacking, making and sharing.
4. Innovative approaches to opening up cultural heritage collections for education.