On Friday, September 22, 9 faculty and staff from GVSU attended the Michigan OER Summit to connect with other faculty across the state in discovering ways to improve student success through the adoption and use of open educational resources.
Pictured Left to Right: Vince St. Germain, Eric Kunnen, Hunter Bridwell, (Dr. Robin DeRosa, Keynote Speaker), Matt Ruen, Genevieve Elrod, Debbie Morrow, Jacklyn Rander, Susan Strouse and Karyn Butler (Not Pictured)
Michigan Colleges Online organized the 2017 MI OER Summit and the goal was to gather together to collaborate about how to advance education through open educational resources. This year, the event was hosted by Kellogg Community College (Battle Creek, MI) at the Binda Performing Arts Center.
The keynote for the Summit was provided by Dr. Robin DeRosa – professor and chair of Interdisciplinary Studies at Plymouth State University, New Hampshire.
The keynote session title was: “Harnessing the Power of OPEN: How Open Education Can Transform Our Assignments, Courses, and Colleges”
In her presentation, Robin focused on how we can come together as a community of learners to transform courses, assignments, and ultimately, our public colleges and universities. With a special focus on Open Educational Resources and Open Pedagogy, Robin offered both ideas to re-inspire a sense of mission in public college instructors and examples of non-disposable assignments that will get students actively contributing to the knowledge commons.
The presentation introduced participants to the idea of connected learning, and offered new ways of conceiving of course architecture to better link students with their scholarly and professional communities of practice.
#MIOERSUMMIT Keynote Highlights
Here are a few of the key points shared in the keynote:
- 56% of students pay more than $300 per semester and 20% of students pay more than $500 per semester on textbooks.
- Students worry more about paying for books than worry about paying for college.
- Open pedagogy is the piece that happens when students are producers of knowledge not just consumers.
- OPEN is about access to knowledge and access to knowledge creation.
- Areas of Caution: Digital redlining and the digital divide are real and insidious. Open is not the opposite of private. EdTech is selling something. Open is a process not a panacea.
- Learn more about this event, along with additional highlights from the keynote on Eric Kunnen’s blog.
In addition to the keynote, there were a variety of breakout sessions by universities and community colleges across Michigan.
Open Education: Putting the PUBLIC back in public Higher Ed.
Learn more about this event, including additional notes from the keynote on Eric Kunnen’s blog.
eLearning Technologies @GVSU 