Introduction to Open Education

Jan. 31, 1-2:30 p.m., Cabell Library, Room 250

The landscape of open education has evolved considerably over the last decade, and this session will serve as an introduction to key issues, ideas, and complications that have shaped the movement. In addition to considering important questions around openness in education, participants will also be challenged to think about how open participates in a network of ideas, and ideals, that will continue to elicit controversy and provoke change in our digital age. Speaker: Gardner Campbell

Open Teaching & Learning

February 21, 1-2:30 p.m., Cabell Library, Room 250

The recent and widespread media attention on Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCs) has put open teaching and learning at the forefront of conversations about the future of higher education. Yet open teaching and learning is not entirely new, nor is it only relevant to the “rockstar” professors at the Ivy Leagues. This session will feature a conversation about the process of opening up one digital storytelling course at the University of Mary Washington, which has been taught open and online for the past three years with some remarkable results. This session will examine the various issues opening up one’s course online might pose for face-to-face teaching practices. It will also examine the implications the possibilities for augmenting learner engagement as well as managing the challenges and concerns of teaching and learning in the open. Speakers: Jim Groom and Martha Burtis of the University of Mary Washington

Open Scholarship

March 28, 1-2:30 p.m., Cabell Library, Room 250

What does “openness” look like for scholars and the scholarship they produce? Or, asked differently, what does the open web afford the modern scholar? Partly as a follow-up to the Open Forum on Open Access held by VCU Libraries in Fall 2013, this session will feature a panel of scholars discussing a wide range of issues from open access publishing to other forms of modern scholarly communication.

Panelists:

• Robert Godwin-Jones, VCU School of World Studies
• Michael Keller, VCU Department of English
• Eric Grollman, University of Richmond, Department of Sociology and Anthropology