The NoC Open Educational Resources (OER)
Since the constitution of the Network of Centers there has been interest in educational activities regarding Internet & Society topics. Given the size and the broadness the Network has reached, there are with no doubts huge exploitable potentialities in this field. Across the Network of Centers, for example, there is a wealth of Internet & Society-related Educational Resources, e.g., videos, podcasts, documents, presentations, syllabi, entire courses, etc.
One of the first goals in this sense is therefore to promote discoverability and reuse of (Open) Educational Resources, by giving the opportunity to the NoC Centers to learn and take inspiration from each other and build on top of existing educational material.
As a first approach to this issue, during Summer 2016, a survey was set up and sent to all the Network Participants in order to discover which (Open) Educational Resources were available around the NoC. The gathered data has then been uploaded on the NoC Community Platform (based on Semantic Media Wiki).
The NoC OER survey data
Until today, 21 Centers completed the survey for a total of 87 Educational Resources, of which:
- 47 were documents;
- 18 were courses;
- 15 were lectures;
- 7 were "other resources” (web platforms, slides).
The resources were in several languages: English (68%), Portuguese (34 %), Spanish (3%), German (2%), Italian (1%).
The topics treated in the analyzed resources are heterogeneous, the most popular are:
- Privacy (28%);
- Copyright (24%);
- Internet Governance (23%);
- Data Protection (23%);
- Digital Economy (21%);
- Other (33%, including Cyber Security, Big Data, Fundamental Rights…).
As regards accessibility and licenses of these materials:
- 79% have a copyleft license (while 21% have a non permissive license);
- 84% of the material is freely accessible online;
- 10% of the material has restricted access;
- 67% of the courses can be attended online.
How to contribute
The survey used in the first stage of the NOC Open Educational Resources is still available here.
Members of the Network of Centers are given the opportunity to contribute to the project by filling the form or by writing us an email at NoC-OER-survey@nexa.polito.it.
Credits
This project was carried out by the Nexa Center for Internet & Society at the Politecnico of Turin with the collaboration of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University and the Centro de Estudos sobre Tecnologia e Sociedade of the University Sao Paulo, Brazil (CEST).
Contacts
For any question or issue don't hesitate to contact us at NoC-OER-survey@nexa.polito.it.