News Archives

Presentation at the Embassy of the Republic of Slovenia, Washington D.C

The Ambassador of the Republic of Slovenia Dr. Bozo Cerar requested our company at the reception celebrating 50 years of the U.S – Slovenia Fulbright Exchange Program, which was preceded by a showcase of Slovenian – American science and education cooperation on October 1, 2015. 

OuS session at White House workshop on open education

OpeningupSlovenia was invited by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of State, to participate in a half-day workshop on open education on September 28, 2015 in New York at the Governance Lab at New York University. We co-lead with Nicole Allen the session on government/civil society collaboration. The room was full of questions, ideas, and enthusiasm. We left with new ideas to address the challenges we may face. Most importantly, we left knowing we are part of a larger community dedicated to expanding access to quality education.

 

 

 

 

2nd Internet of Education Conference kick-starts “Openingup” in the Balkans

OpeningupSlovenia members together with the UNESCO Chair in OER, Knowledge 4 All Foundation, Microsoft Bosnia and the Ministry Of Education, Science And Youth Canton Sarajevo organized a “best practice transfer” event in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina last Friday at 9.30. The 2nd Internet of Education Conference (IOE 2015) in Sarajevo provided an opportunity to highlight the importance of the following in open education: 1) technical developments in support of open learning environments (as indicated in the EC communication Opening up Education),  2) the value of multi-lingual tools in increasing access to open education and MOOCs, in particular the tools developed within the TraMOOC, EMMA, TransLectures and Active2Trans projects and OER gathering projects like ExplorEdu, and ICT in schools via MyMachine,  3) the smart partnership across different stakeholders in education from primary and HEI to civil society, governments and companies as reflected in the OpeningupSlovenia initiative. This was a great opportunity to discuss and design best practice transfer from Slovenia and Europe, stimulate a strategy for new regional “Openingup” initiatives and present what is already being developed in the SEE region.

OuS invited to EDUsummit 2015

OpeningupSlovenia members were invitedto the EDUsummit 2015 in Bangkok, Thailand, in September 2015. The tentative dates are Sept 14-15. We were fortunate to have UNESCO Office in Bangkok and Curtin University as our hosts. In preparation for EDUsummIT 2015, the planning team set up a research team for each of the eight thematic working groups, with a special focus on two themes that have been identified by the Ministers of Education in the Asia-Pacific region who have been working with UNESCO Office in Bangkok. The theme of prime importance to the Ministers in which OpeningupSlovenia was involved as a case study was in the EDUsummIT thematic working group on “Smart Partnership”. 

OuS invited to Future of Universities Workshop

OpeningupSlovenia members were invited to the #FutureU workshop @ Leuphana Digital School in Lüneburg. The event was a hands-on Thinkathon for practitioners of digital education from different disciplines and domains. Moderated and led by Prof. Dr. Nishant Shah and Felix C. Seyfarth which envisioned it as a gathering of experts with stakes in the future of universities in the digital age, to produce a dialogue and a debate towards concrete ideas for research, practice, and development in the field of online learning. Keynote speaker Elizabeth Losh (University of California,San Diego) provided an initial impulse, addressing the ‘War Against Learning’.

 

2nd traMOOC project meeting in Corfu

traMOOC partners have meet for the second time to discuss progress and future strategy, this time in Corfu. In a follow-up to the Berlin meeting, traMOOC partners have meet to evaluate the progress made in each work package during the first few months of the project. They have also prepared for the forthcoming European Commission review and consolidate exploitation strategy which also focuses on OpeningupSlovenia and other plans for year two and beyond.

 

 

 

1st MyMachine Slovenia exhibition of prototypes

As OpeningupSlovenia aims at researchers, practitioners, policy makers and educators to deeply explore open education and its impact on global education its project portfolio applauds the 1st MyMachine Slovenia Exhibition at the Museum of Architecture and Design.

MyMachine is one of the flagship projects on open education that we are running and it included 150 children, pupils and students, 13  teachers and professors which created 120 ideas and drawings of dream machines and produced 4 dream machines in total.

 

The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation’s OER Grantees Meeting 2015

OpeningupSlovenia was invited to the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation‘s 2015 Open Educational Resources Grantees Meeting, which was held March 24 – 27, 2015. The meeting was hosted by the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME), and took place at the historic Cavallo Point Lodge in Sausalito, California. 

Although OuS has not received any funding by the Hewlett Foundation this was a great opportunity to meet all the relevant professionals and their projects that did receive funding and were selected as best practices in OER in 2014 and 2015. In terms of attending the breakout sessions and keynotes we were pleasantly surprised and inspired by Douglas Gayeton’s (Lexicon of Sustainability) keynote “Learning from Disrupters in Other Industries”.

UNESCO Chairs in OER International Meeting

Professor Rory McGreal from Athabasca University– Canada’s Open University based in Alberta, Canada held the first UNESCO Chairs in OER international meeting in conjuction with the Open Education Global 2015 conference in Banff, Alberta.

The meeting included the four already existing ‘older’ Chairs and the newly appointed Chairs. The meeting revolved around a few topics such as presenting the UNESCO OER Programme for 2014-2017, the UNESCO Chairs in OER common Plan of Action, OER Projects from the other invitees with emphasis  on strengthening collaboration among the UNESCO Chairs in OER.

An important discussion was held on creating  more synergy between the UNESCO OER Programme operated by Paris and the Action Lines run by the UNESCO Chairs in OER. The chairs also had a presentation for PhD students in OER at the GO-GN network meeting.

 

Opening up Slovenia welcomes Opening up Canada

At the Open Education Global conference 2015 in Banff, Alberta, Canada, assistant Deputy Minister Peter Leclaire of Advanced Learning and Community Partnerships, Ministry of Innovation and Advanced Education announced the “Opening up Canada”. The Open Education Global 2014 was hosted in Slovenia, where OpeningupSlovenia was launched.