Jun
28
Why I Hope to Attend the Open Education Conference!
June 28, 2009 | 1 Comment
The Open Education Conference coordinators are doing something I think is quite innovative. They are offering travel scholarships to people who can offer something great by attending the conference. This will help get 3 more people, who might not have the money to attend, make it to the event and share in the community.
In addition, the form they decided to use to get applicants is an interesting one. They are having applicants create a blog post, like this one, with the answer to a few simple questions. This might seem weird at first, but when you think of marketing, this is a great way to create buzz around the conference and increase the number of backlinks for the conference website for SEO purposes.
Now for the questions from the original scholarship blog post:
(Open Education Conference : http://openedconference.org/archives/324)
1. What you would “bring” to the conference? What can you contribute, be it a willingness to volunteer to moderate a session, some special expertise or project, an already accepted proposal…
My name is Phillip Barnes, and I’m a recent graduate from Point Loma Nazarene University. With the help of my partner Jarod Gorla, I’m changing the way professors use textbooks. For the past two years, I’ve been researching the open education resource movement, and have compiled a draft of what I believe is the next big step in the textbook industry. Over the past 6 months, we have been coding a prototype and hope to launch our website in the next month or two.
Our model takes the work of Connexions and Flat World Knowledge (the two leaders in this movement) and improves upon it to create electronic textbooks which are relevant, engaging, and inexpensive for students. I can’t get into too many detail for competitive reasons (we don’t want this model to end up in the wrong hands), but through the journey my partner and I have embarked on, I have learned a great deal of information about open education and came up with a few ideas I think are worth spreading.
Keep in mind, I have done all of this from a student’s perspective. It’s great to have a bunch of PhD talk about these issues, but if students are the end target for this movement, we need more of their voices being heard at conferences like this.
2. What you see as the most critical issue facing you in your efforts around Open Education, and how you think the conference can help you address it?
My top priority with attending this conference is connecting with the great minds in open education.
I’m currently working with professors from Point Loma Nazarene University, Fresno State University, and Fresno Pacific University to bring textbook into the 21st century. I’ve also had several meetings with President Brower and Vice President Watkins of PLNU, to determine how we can bring open education resources into my alma mater: Point Loma Nazarene University.
I’ve spoken with Victor Vuchic, OER Program Officer for the Hewlett Foundation, and I’m planning to meet with him in the near future. That meeting could be in the San Fransisco area where he works; Or, if things work out as I plan, in Vancouver at this conference.
I would like to meet with some people behind Creative Commons. They are doing some great things regarding the spread of information and creativity. I’m particularly interested in their recent research on the use of non-commercial in their licenses.
The list of people I want to speak with could go on for quite a while, so I will just say this: I want to attend the conference so I can become a tighter part of the community around open education. I hope you can give me the opportunity with the scholarship. You won’t regret it, I promise!!!
Email: pbarnes100 [at] pointloma.edu
