SI521 "Open Educational Resources at the University of Michigan" Open Textbook/Glossary

This glossary provides brief definitions of important terminology used in the textbook, arranged alphabetically. At the end of each defintion, links are provided to the chapter or chapters where it occurs.

C

• Commons: the idea of shared resources, or resources that are not owned by anyone in particular, rather by everyone (mentioned in: Commons)

• Continuing Medical Education (CME): the annual professional development required by medical practitioners in order to maintain their license. Some professional associations and institutions are looking to OER as a component of online CME. (mentioned in: OpenHealth)

• Copyright: Copyright refers to a series of protections (“rights”) given to an author of an original creation for a limited time. These rights allow the author to have primary control over use of her material, and thereby preserve for her a monopoly over her creation, but only for limited time. In order for qualify for copyright in the U.S., a work must be in a tangible form (e.g. written, painted, recorded, etc.) and exhibit creative expression. (mentioned in: Foundations, Openness, Copyright, OpenAccess, Open Courseware, Open Access Publishing, Open ICT4D)

• Creative Commons: a nonprofit organization founded in 2001 that designed a series of licenses for use, reuse, and redistribution of materials within copyright laws. There are six Creative Commons licenses which allow the user to select which combination of three characteristics (attribution, commercial and non-commercial uses, and viral license or "share alike") that would like to attach to their works. Creative Commons also offers waiver (CC0) or dedication (public domain certification) options in which creators waive all of the copyrights that might hold in a work and contribute it to the public domain. (mentioned in: Copyright, Open Courseware, Open ICT4D)

D

• dScribe: a low-cost and scalable OER publication process developed by U-M faculty, students, and alumni. Students know as dScribes, short for “digital and distributed Scribes,” gather, review, clear, and edit course materials for publication as OER. Since dScribes are often currently in enrolled in the course, they have the context to easily clear and add metadata (e.g. keywords) to the materials. (mentioned in: Foundations, Challenges of Producing OER, OpenTextbook, OpenHealth)

G

• Genre: A class of texts that can be distinguished by their shared linguistic features and situation in similar contexts. Textbooks constitute a distinct genre, as do classroom lectures. (mentioned in Genre and OER)

H

• Human Development Index (HDI): a collection of development indicators used by the United Nations Development Program. In addition to financial indicators such as GDP per capita, the HDI considers health, food security, education, life expectancy, and other dimensions of well-being. (mentioned in: Open ICT4D)

I

• Information Communication Technologies for Development (ICT4D): a specialization within international development that focuses on the role of communication technology in economic development and poverty alleviation. The concept dates back to the 1950s but the term emerged in the 1990s due the rise of the Internet. (mentioned in: Open ICT4D)

• Intergovernmental organization (IGO): an internal organization consisting of representatives from national governments (e.g. United Nations, African Union) (mentioned in: Open ICT4D)

M

• Millennium Development Goals (MDGs): an ambitious plan developed by United Nations member nations, intergovernmental organization (IGOs), nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and national governments to drastically improve economic and social conditions in developing countries by 2015. The MDGs include eight goals ranging from education to poverty to the environment. The eight goals are: 1) eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, 2) achieve universal primary education, 3) promote gender equality and empower women, 4) reduce child mortality, 5) improve maternal health, 6) combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases, 7) ensure environmental sustainability, and 8) develop a global partnership for development. (mentioned in: OpenHealth, Open ICT4D)

N

• Nongovernmental organization (NGO): an organization that has public political, social, economic, or environmental concerns but is privately funded and not affiliated with a government body. international NGOs are sometimes referred to as INGOs. (mentioned in: OpenHealth, Open ICT4D)

O

• Open Access (OA): a model of publication distribution, whereby the public may access the resource free of charge. Some models of Open Access account for low copyright barriers, allowing users to redistribute the material in full, given citation. Other models account for open access but have varying degrees of copyright protections. (mentioned in Foundations, OpenAccess, OpenHealth)

• Open Courseware (OCW): a subset of OER that is a part of a larger movement that promotes free and unrestricted access to knowledge. An open courseware site provides open access to the primary teaching materials for courses taught at educational institutions, enabling educators to draw on the materials for teaching purposes, and students and self-learners to use and remix or adapt the materials for the development of their own personal knowledge. (mentioned in Open Courseware)

• Open Education (OE): an umbrella term that refers to the free transfer of teaching methodologies, ideas or information used for educational purposes via the Internet. (mentioned in Open Learning)

• Open Educational Resources (OER): educational resources such as course materials, videos, software tools, image collections and student work, that all have open copyright licenses that enable free use, remixing and redistribution. (mentioned in each chapter)

• Open Learning (OL): a pedagogy where much of the learning process is controlled by the learner. It seeks to allow learners to engage in learning experiences (likely virtual) around OER available on the Internet. It is an interest-driven, self-guided philosophy of learning and teaching. (mentioned in Open Learning)

• Open Source Software (OSS): software with a free source code that is often developed through peer-production models. The code often contains a viral license allowing others to freely use and modify the code but requiring adaptations to be released under the same open copyright license. Apache and Linux are examples of OSS. (mentioned in Foundations, Openness, OpenAccess)

P

• Peer Production: a method of production whereby individuals build something without specific monetary incentives. (mentioned in PeerProduction)

• Public Domain: the collection of works which are not eligible for copyright or whose copyright term has expired. In the United States, works of the federal government, regardless of publication date, are in the public domain. (mentioned in Commons, Copyright)

S

• Scholarship: the pursuit, advancement, and dissemination of knowledge, particularly through universities (mentioned in: Open Scholarship)

U

• United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO): a specialized United Nations agency involved in the definition, development, and proliferation of OER (mentioned in: Foundations, Open Courseware, Open ICT4D, Open Learning)