Open learning can defined as the very wide concept of removing barriers for learning (1). Using this definition most teaching probably would be defined as open learning, since teaching should be about supporting learning of all our students. Open learning can also relate to the UN sustainable development goal 4 (SDG4) “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” (2). Several of the targets for SDG4 clearly refer to open learning, for example 4.3: “By 2030, ensure equal access for all women and men to affordable and quality technical, vocational and tertiary education, including university”. Open learning can clearly contribute to provide equal access to education.
A more narrow definition of open learning would be to give access to learning to students who are not enrolled in the university programme or course. One can ask the question why would a university open up and give access to educational material or courses to others than the own students? One example of open learning provided by universities are MOOCs (massive open online courses) hosted by for example by the EdX platform funded by Harvard and MIT (3). MOOCs gives opportunity to “share knowledge generated by the university with a broad and global audience” (as stated by Karolinska Institutet regarding MOOCs) (4). Open learning can also contribute to recruitment of students to the university’s regular programmes by making the university known worldwide and by giving the open learning students a good background for applying to the regular programme (as an example MITx MicroMasters Programs) (5). Universities can provide open learning at different levels, completely open sources that will not provide any certificate, courses with exams that provide a certificate and courses that provide a university degree (see example Stanford Online) (6).
Another aspect of open learning is the availability of open educational resources. These give both teacher and students access to material that is not produced by the own university or included in the traditional course literature. Open educational resources can be in a multitude of formats, online text books, recorded lectures, quizzes, open courses, PowerPoint presentations (7). The openness can be at different levels, from open to use for your own purpose to open to modify, share and use for a new purpose (7). For students open educational resources offer the opportunity to find on their own extra material to reinforce the learning or to practice. The resources provided by the Khan academy is a good example of useful material for this purpose (8). A challenge can be to assess the quality of the available resources. Some material has been produced by well-known universities that might be a guarantee for quality. Material that is produced by individual teachers does not have the same quality control. Can likes and reviews act as such?
Teachers in many cases prefer to produce their own material that is well targeted to the learning outcomes of their course. Especially advanced level courses might be quite specialized and suitable open educational resources might not be available. However for many basic or generic topics material is probably available and could be used. The challenge is to find the useful material among all open educational resources on the internet. Searching for material could be very time consuming. Sharing material among teachers is often a common practice. But sometimes there is no structure in place for sharing. Local, national or global communities of teachers within the same field could be a solution.
Open learning should form the basis for all university teaching, our aim is to contribute to the UN sustainable development goal 4, by providing high quality education and sharing our knowledge and skills.
References
1. ONL201 Topic 2 introduction. Open education. https://play.lnu.se/media/t/0_sg20f0kk cited April 9, 2020
2. https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg4 cited April 9, 2020
3. EdX https://www.edx.org/about-us cited April 9, 2020
4. https://www.edx.org/school/kix cited April 9, 2020
5. https://micromasters.mit.edu cited April 9, 2020
6. https://online.stanford.edu/about-us/stanford-credentials cited April 9, 2020
7. Bates, T. (2019). Teaching in a Digital Age: Guidelines for Teaching and Learning. (2nd edition) https://pressbooks.bccampus.ca/teachinginadigitalagev2/
8. https://www.khanacademy.org cited April 9, 2020
