The Open Education Consortium Welcomes New Members (October 2014)

The OE Consortium is pleased to announce the addition of 6 new institutional members:

See the links below for more information about these members.

College of Du Page

Created in 1967, College of DuPage is a large community college in the western suburbs of Chicago. With over 28,000 students, they are the second-largest provider of undergraduate education in the state of Illinois, offering nine associates degrees in 59 occupational and 45 transfer programs as well as over 50 certificate programs. Their main campus is in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, and is comprised of 11 buildings on 273 acres.

College of Du Page is firmly rooted in the community that provides their mandate, yet committed to reflecting the needs and demands of an ever-changing world. They understand the importance of remaining relevant on multiple levels: interpersonal, academic, civic, cultural and economic. With a steady eye on regional, national and international developments, College of DuPage fulfills its mission as an educational and economic agent of change for the residents it serves.

College of DuPage is in the early stages of building institutional support for open education. They are investigating the landscape of open education resources and identifying ways in which they can contribute to the open education community. The first phase of their commitment is to education and professional development for their faculty and staff. They are holding a professional development week focused on open education resources and tools, and their librarians are actively evaluating and providing access to appropriate resources, and assist faculty in locating and selecting open access textbook and supplemental materials. Also members of the CCCOER.

National Changhua University of Education

National Changhua University of Education (NCUE) has evolved into a comprehensive university focusing on education and emphasizing research. Besides retaining the distinguished teacher-training curriculum, their programs on science, engineering and management emphasize the connection with technological and industrial practice. Moreover, considering the trend of diversity in educational formats, the university offers digital learning environments in seven colleges, forty-four master programs and fifteen doctoral programs. Integrating teacher training and professional programs to prepare the students with professionalism and competitiveness is an important characteristic of NCUE.

National Changhua University of Education (NCUE) established “OpenCourseWare” in 2013. The purpose of OCW at NCUE is to make full use of learning resources at the University and to convert professional courses into digital form. Moreover, they aim to share e-learning courses with lifelong learners and teachers inside and outside campus. The e-learning Center plays an important role in turning traditional learning materials to digital formats, improving instructional methods and also in strengthening inter-school exchanges.

Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT)

Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) is one of the world’s most prestigious educational and research institutions. It trains highly qualified specialists in theoretical and applied physics, applied mathematics, informatics, biotechnology and related disciplines. From the beginning, MIPT has used a unique education system. The general principles are rigorous selection of gifted young individuals, extensive education in fundamentals, involvement of leading scientists in the students’ learning process, and use of the best research laboratories in the country to teach in the atmosphere of scientific discovery and innovative engineering. Among MIPT alumni are Nobel laureates, founders of high-technology companies, inventors, and engineers.

Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) has a wide range of open educational programs and is currently searching for new ways to use best world practices and provide their competences all over the world to make knowledge accessible through the OEC network.

Telkom University

Telkom University was established on August 14, 2013 by the Decree of Director General of Higher Education (Kemendikbud) number 309/E/0/2013. Telkom University is a private university established by Telkom Education Foundation. It was formed out of a merger of four private higher educations, namely Telkom Institute of Technology (founded as STT Telkom, 1990), Telkom Institute of Management (founded as STMB Telkom, 1990), Telkom Polytechnic (Politel, 2007), and Telkom College of Art and Design Indonesia (STISI Telkom, 2011).

Telkom is committed to ‘openness’ through a variety of channels. They recently launched their OpenLibrary following the guideline that it must be: 1) open for all types of knowledge, 2) open for knowledge sharing with other knowledge management systems, and 3) open for public. In addition, they have several programs like “Telkom Teaches” where they send lecturers and students to distant areas to give information about health, technologies, politics, humanity, etc. They have two open courses at the moment and plan on continue producing more.

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia

42 years since it’s inception, UKM has produced 146,362 graduates. The university has since attracted global attention, as seen in the 2,937 students from 42 nations. UKM was appointed as one of the four research universities of Malaysia in 2006 based on its excellent record in research. That recognition has gained further ground when the Malaysia Genome Institute (MGI) and the International Institute of Global Health, United Nations University were set up at the university. Its areas of research were further consolidated and enhanced with the identification of eight niche areas; Challenges to Nation Building, Sustainable Territorial Development, Renewable Energy, Health and Medical Technology, Climate Change, Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials, Biological Diversity in Biotechnology Development and ICT: Content Informatics.

UKM is also the recipient of the Prime Minister’s Quality Award 2006; recognition of its excellent achievements in the academic and management fields. It has also been conferred the status of an Autonomous University in January 2012. It’s through these strong foundations that UKM aims to enhance its level of excellence via its 2000-2020 (PS2020) Strategic Plan: ‘Inspiring Futures, Nurturing Possibilities’.

UKM’s slogan: ‘A National University with an International Reach’ falls in perfect line with the OEC’s philosophy. UKM understands that internationalization comes with visibility and visibility comes with openness. Therefore their educational platform needs to be open and their valuable courses need to be shared with the world. Currently UKM is in the process of completing the development of their OER platform known as ORI@UKM.MY ORI stands for Open Resource Initiatives. ORI acts as their central OER repository that aggregates & displays OER content developed by their faculty members to be shared with the global audience.

Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (Sultan Idris Education University)

UPSI is located in Tanjung Malim, Perak Darul Ridzuan hosting two campuses, Sultan Abdul Jalil Shah and Sultan Azlan Shah, with 9 faculties and a variety of programs.

UPSI is committed to making a difference in education through teaching, research, publication, consultancy and community services to achieve the vision of the nation.

Aligned with the Malaysian Education Ministry policy of the e-Learning, UPSI is keen to utilize OCW as a platform to support the development of a broader range of knowledge and the formation of 21st century skills. Moreover, UPSI want to encourage more students to pursue tertiary education. OCW will also make lectures more productive in R & D without compromising the quality of teaching and learning.

The Malaysian Government, through the Ministry of Education, has set up a new commitment to implement OCWs and MOOCs for the higher and tertiary education. UPSI aims to become champion in establishing strategies, framework and best practices in OCW implementation. Their OCW platform (Open4Learn) has been selected together with another international platform to be tested and evaluated in terms of effectiveness in handling OCW materials, authors and end users. If chosen by the Ministry of Education (MOE) Open4Learn will become the sole OER/OCW platform to 20 universities in Malaysia, publishing resources under an open license CCBY-NC-SA.

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