Webinar 1.0 – OER Webinar Series for African Librarians
Topic: – An Introduction to OER
Date & Time: Wednesday April 3rd 2019, 11am GMT
Quality education is basic for the development of Africa. Goal 4 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” as well as the second Goal of the first Pillar, AU 2063 Agenda – “well educated citizens and skills revolution underpinned by science, technology and innovation” highlight this. Building up the intellectual capital of Africa through quality education even as the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) births in the continent has become very critical. Consequently, teachers and students at all levels need relevant, quality, up-to-date, easily accessible and affordable or no-cost information resources in order to achieve this. Lifelong learners, especially those not engaged in formal education and those engaged in distance learning also need access to affordable and quality information resources in order to understand current best practices and developments in their fields of interest. With the ongoing penetration of Internet penetration in Africa, Open Educational Resources (OER) have become a viable option to provide these information resources to African students and teachers and lifelong learners.
African Library and Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA) is deeply committed to the development of knowledgeable, skilled, and passionate African librarians that can form the information superstructure for the 4IR on the continent. Therefore, the Association believes that it is quite critical to build up the capacity of African librarians in the area of OER. This has great potentials of driving quality education that can birth innovations for the transformation of African communities.
There are an estimated 1.1 billion open resources. But what exactly are OERs and do they live up to the hype? What does this mean for librarians who want to help users find content and curate it? Do librarians know how to search for and identity useful open resources? What is open knowledge?
This introductory webinar will explain the concepts of OER. Participants will be guided through a search strategy for open content, which they can adopt and use to train students and faculty members. Participants will also learn to decipher Creative Commons rights and permissions.
About the presenter
Neil Butcher is based in South Africa, from where he has provided policy and technical advice and support to a range of national and international clients regarding educational planning, uses of educational technology and distance education. Neil has traveled extensively through the developing world conducting research on educational policy, higher education, distance education, education management information systems, and educational technology for a range of organizations, governments, and donors. He works with OER Africa as the project’s OER Strategist and is also currently consulting to the World Bank on a range of project activities across several African countries and in Asia.
A list of resources and further information will be available at the end of the webinar, to enable thorough engagement with the webinar content. Bring this to the attention of your colleagues in the library and in professional circles you belong to. It is free! Join us let’s upgrade the quality of education in Africa and increase the growth of intellectual capital that will drive the 4IR in our continent.