HEA Open Educational Resources case study: Promoting UK OER Internationally – The ONCE project

The ONCE project was a collaboration led by the Centre for Learning and Teaching in Art and Design (CLTAD) at the University of the Arts London (UAL) with the Department of Media in the School of Art and Design at Coventry University. The project was a short one that ran from the end of September 2012 to the end of January 2013 and was funded by the Higher Education Academy (HEA), This funding was provided as part of the UK government-backed Open Educational Resources (OER) Phase Three Programme to support an OER International initiative by the HEA to explore how OER engagement by Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) might be used as a business tool to build relationships with foreign organisations. The ONCE project was one of several projects funded by that initiative, the particular theme we explored was that of ‘fostering relationships with other organisations’. Our project involved a disciplinary focus on Art, Design and Media (ADM). The project aimed to provide mutual support to both institutions in the process of joining an international OER organization; the Open Courseware Consortium (OCWC) http://www.ocwconsortium.org/. These 2 partners had accumulated considerable experience and profile in the national and international OER community and this exercise was intended to act as a ‘capstone’ exercise to that previous activity and to gain the further attention and buy-in of senior management – the profile and prestige of the OCWC and its members being a major factor in helping with this. This case study tells the story of how we went about facilitating our applications for joining the OCWC and provides a background to the development of OER activity in the UK and elsewhere and the nature of the OCWC, the organization we set out to join. It also provides a description and analysis of the current state of the ADM HE sector in relation to OER engagement and makes explicit links between this and the changing HE environment in the UK and the need for professional and institutional change.