A Tale of Two Globes: Exploring the North/South Divide in Engagement with Open Educational Resources

In this chapter we consider what evidence exists of a divide between the Global North and Global South in terms of engagement with open educational resources (OER), understanding engagement as the production and sharing of educational materials online. We discuss whether identifying educators as contributors or consumers of OER can be empirically grounded, and advocate advancing internet access in developing countries to reach a global balance where sharing is key

Co-authorship in the age of cyberculture: Open Educational Resources at the Open University of the United Kingdom

Locating Open Educational Resources (OER) as a phenomenon of cyberculture, this paper presents a reflection on the possibilities of co-authorship that are entailed in OER initiatives of different natures and settings within a large organisation. A selection of OER-related projects and activities carried out at the Open University of United Kingdom (UKOU) are examined from the perspective of a comparative framework proposed by Okada (2010). The framework identifies key features and differences between ‘Closed’ and ‘Open’ Education, that is, respectively, formal education, which takes place within the constraints of institutional Virtual Learning Environments, and informal education, which is gradually taking place more widely in cyberspace. The paper is introduced with a succinct discussion of the connection between cyberculture and the emergence of OER, followed by a presentation of the comparative framework adopted. The UKOU´s structure and methods are then presented, and various projects are discussed. The article concludes by proposing a brief commentary on the creative potential that is being unleashed at the very boundaries between formal and informal educational spaces that cyberculture is challenging

Developing Open Educational Resources through Learning Design and Agile Practices

One of the current challenges related to Open Educational Resources (OERs) is how to produce quality and relevant materials to be reused and adapted to different contexts and learning situations. In this paper we present a flexible and systematic method for OERs, called AM-OER, that allows the development of OERs to evolve incrementally, and be modified and improved as needed. Practices of Learning Design are incorporated into the OERs development, making the design more understandable and shareable, and facilitating the reuse and adaptation. We applied AM-OER through a case study involving the development of a course in the software engineering domain. The results obtained suggest the applicability and usefulness of the AM-OER in the development of OERs

Dynamic ductile to brittle transition in a one-dimensional model of viscoplasticity

We study two closely related, nonlinear models of a viscoplastic solid. These models capture essential features of plasticity over a wide range of strain rates and applied stresses. They exhibit inelastic strain relaxation and steady flow above a well defined yield stress. In this paper, we describe a first step in exploring the implications of these models for theories of fracture and related phenomena. We consider a one dimensional problem of decohesion from a substrate of a membrane that obeys the viscoplastic constitutive equations that we have constructed. We find that, quite generally, when the yield stress becomes smaller than some threshold value, the energy required for steady decohesion becomes a non-monotonic function of the decohesion speed. As a consequence, steady state decohesion at certain speeds becomes unstable. We believe that these results are relevant to understanding the ductile to brittle transition as well as fracture stability.Comment: 10 pages, REVTeX, 12 postscript figure

A pilot Internet "Value of Health" Panel: recruitment, participation and compliance

Objectives To pilot using a panel of members of the public to provide preference data via the Internet Methods A stratified random sample of members of the general public was recruited and familiarised with the standard gamble procedure using an Internet based tool. Health states were perdiodically presented in "sets" corresponding to different conditions, during the study. The following were described: Recruitment (proportion of people approached who were trained); Participation (a) the proportion of people trained who provided any preferences and (b) the proportion of panel members who contributed to each "set" of values; and Compliance (the proportion, per participant, of preference tasks which were completed). The influence of covariates on these outcomes was investigated using univariate and multivariate analyses. Results A panel of 112 people was recruited. 23% of those approached (n = 5,320) responded to the invitation, and 24% of respondents (n = 1,215) were willing to participate (net = 5.5%). However, eventual recruitment rates, following training, were low (2.1% of those approached). Recruitment from areas of high socioeconomic deprivation and among ethnic minority communities was low. Eighteen sets of health state descriptions were considered over 14 months. 74% of panel members carried out at least one valuation task. People from areas of higher socioeconomic deprivation and unmarried people were less likely to participate. An average of 41% of panel members expressed preferences on each set of descriptions. Compliance ranged from 3% to 100%. Conclusion It is feasible to establish a panel of members of the general public to express preferences on a wide range of health state descriptions using the Internet, although differential recruitment and attrition are important challenges. Particular attention to recruitment and retention in areas of high socioeconomic deprivation and among ethnic minority communities is necessary. Nevertheless, the panel approach to preference measurement using the Internet offers the potential to provide specific utility data in a responsive manner for use in economic evaluations and to address some of the outstanding methodological uncertainties in this field

Open educational resources: some usage aspects

Openness is one of the most influential drivers of change in education and training today, especially for educational organizations both in adult learning as well as in higher education. Open educational resources (ОER) as a manifestation of the principle of openness is gradually becoming an integral part of the educational environment in higher education. When you are citing the document, use the following link http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/2942

Factors that promote or hinder maternal health service provision by female community health volunteers in rural Nepal

Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHVs) provide basic Maternal Health Services (MHSs) to pregnant women and mothers in their communities. Their contribution to maternal health has been praised, as Nepal managed to reduce its maternal mortality by more than two-thirds and met the Millennium Development Goal 5. However, little published evidence is available on FCHVs’ views and the factors that promote or hinder their services. This thesis explores the role of FCHVs in MHS provision in two regions (the hill and Terai ) of Nepal, from the perspectives of health workers, service users, and FCHVs themselves. A qualitative approach was adopted using semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions (FGDs) and field notes. Interviews were conducted with 20 FCHVs, 11 health workers and 26 women in villages from the two study regions. In addition, four FGDs were held with 19 FCHVs and field notes were taken throughout the data collection. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. Findings indicate that FCHVs play an important role in MHS provision in the hill villages where there is limited access to professional healthcare. The FCHVs detected pregnancies, referred them for health check-ups, accompanied them for deliveries and assisted in child-births. They also distributed medicines and informed women on the availability of safe abortion services. In both regions, the FCHVs raised health awareness among pregnant women/mothers casually or through organised meetings. In the hill villages, they used interesting casual approaches to share maternal health information, for example, singing folk songs with health messages in them or visiting new mothers with nutritious food hampers. Such services were beneficial to the women in the remote villages, who otherwise would not have received any healthcare. The FCHVs also shared maternal health messages through regularly organised mothers' group meetings. Unfortunately, these meetings were also used for monetary discussions, which left a little time for discussion on health topics. Such activity combined with the lack of FCHVs’ education often proved to be counterproductive on their service provision. They have a desire to volunteer, as they saw their service as social responsibility, felt empowered and enjoyed community recognition. However, a lack of financial and non-financial incentives was the key hindrance for them followed by perceived community misconceptions regarding their voluntary status. The FCHVs’ illiteracy and older age also affected their services. Finally, various health systems related factors also hindered their services: a lack of access to medical supplies, inadequate training and supervision. In general, volunteers in the terai region were less supported than those in the hill region. In addition, a perceived lack of respect by some health workers towards volunteers and a lack of coordination between government health centres and NGOs were noted. Overall, the study found that most interviewees perceived FCHVs as a valuable resource in improving the maternal health of the poor women. In some remote hill villages, they are the only MHS providers. Therefore, their contribution to MHS needs to be recognised and respected by both the health workers and the communities. It is important that FCHVs are provided with context specific support - incentives, access to supplies and supportive supervision - to enable them to deliver services more productively and to ensure that these services flourish in the future

International migration : human rights and development dimensions

According to the United Nations and the OECD, more than 230 million people were living outside their countries of birth in 2013 with an additional 700 million migrating internally within their countries (UN DESA and OECD 2013). Current research and analysis has suggested that in the coming decades, demographic changes, increasing globalisation in a context of growing international inequality and climate change will significantly increase migration pressures within and across borders, at least in the short to medium term (see, for example UNDP 2009, IOM 2010, OECD 2007 and 2009).peer-reviewe