The consortium partners in OCW-EU consider open education to be an essential component of the development of virtual mobility. It enables students to follow a program away from their home campus and/or better prepare themselves before studying abroad. It increases transparency by showing what HEI have to offer which may assist students in their selection of the right foreign institute. It is also a valuable tool to facilitate and enhance cooperation between institutes. For Lifelong Learners open education provides access to state of the art education and high quality courses for their continuing development. It is flexible and therefore easier to combine with professional activities than traditional Lifelong Learning programs.
The main objective of the project is to support virtual mobility on the basis of OpenCourseWare. On top of that, an European OCW network will improve conditions for Lifelong Learners, who are an important user group of OCW. Policies play an important role in facilitating use, production and uptake of OER
and maximizing it’s potential. Therefore we have included Open Policy as an integral part of the OCW-EU project.
Open Policies
In order for OCW to be integrated into educational practice, policies must be in place that encourages its production and use. Development of these policies at the national and institutional levels can build upon existing policies of open sharing, open access, lifelong learning and student mobility. We have compared and assessed European policies that we have gathered in an overview of European policies and a Case study library with best practices on various aspects of Open Policies, spread over different policy levels (Institutional/National/Supranational). This forms
the basis for our Open Policy Guidelines.
Open Policy Guidelines
The purpose of these guidelines is to provide an overview of the ‘decision points’ that need to be taken into account when developing, implementing or improving Open Policy at (HE) institutions. Depending on your role in your institution, the current state of your open initiative, and your goals, you might use this set of guidelines differently.
