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The article I chose to review is that of Chris Jones, Mirea Asensio & Peter Goodyear (2000) Networked learning in higher education: practitioners’ perspectives, ALT-J, 8:2, 18-28. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/0968776000080203?needAccess=true  Accessed on September 7^th, 2019. As a lecturer still using a traditional face-to-face approach of education and wishing to gradually initiate technology enhanced learning, I have found the article so interesting in several ways. Before the content, I liked the phenomenographical research approach that seeks to understand people's ways of experiencing the world. Thus, through interviews, the paper is based on the data that expresses networked practitioner’s experiences with the practice.  I realise that the paper previews the unit learning objective one which says, “be familiar with the design of the module and the project choices required of you”. The paper thus tackles issues of course design, inclusiveness, innovation and implementation. These inform the pedagogical approaches within, such as constructive learning, collaborative learning as well as the tensions that accrue from strict structured and loose structured modes of assessment. These tensions have an implication on the learning design as well as learning outcomes. It was revealed that very structured modes of assessment with strict deadlines impended the creativity that would come with more time, if the learners had it.  Thus, highlighting the challenges of the course implementation. The other methodological design that impressed me to capture the above is the cross-sectional approach whereby interviewees were selected from 5 universities across 8 study programs including IT, law, education, library, information studies, and management. This depicts the inclusiveness of the research, approach and data.

Among the findings, what interested me was that networked practices are not a single invent occasion. In the due course, practitioners confessed that at first, they got challenges of working with an online environment, and so are the learners.  This at times led to disappointments as many learners dropped off.  It was revealed that at times, practitioners worked offline and loaded online later, thus compromising the learning outcomes and course designs. However, with time of application, the practitioners revealed that they got comfortable with the networked practice. For a practitioner who dealt with post-graduate courses, he confessed having it easy, an implication that conceptualization of learning objectives as well as motivation of learners can ease networked practices at higher learning.

Quoting (SoLar, 2011), Heather Gibson and Alan Clarke (2018) define learning analytics as the measurement, collection, analysis, and reporting of data about learners and their contexts, for purposes of understanding and optimizing learning and the environments in which it occurs.  They observe that Ferguson (2018) emphasizes that it is important that the data generated by learning analytics is acted upon, so the definition can be amended as follows:  "The measurement, collection, analysis, reporting, and use of data about learners and their contexts, for purposes of understanding and enhancing learning and the environments in which it occurs". Based on this, in the table attached, is an assessment of the learning analytics that applies for H817 block 3 on Learning Design Studio.

According to Dyckhoff et al (2013),  learning analytics is understood as the development and exploration of methods and tools for visual analysis and pattern recognition in educational data to permit institutions, teachers, and students to iteratively reflect on learning processes and, thus, call for the optimization of learning designs on the on hand and aid the improvement of learning on the other. Based on the definition in comparison with the Teachers questions asked on Table 1 and the learning analytic goals in Table 4, I observe the following;

-          Learning analytics have been narrowed to data generation and the learning technologies without considering the issues behind the data. Among these are: motivations, inspiration and challenges.

-          Learning analytics have also been narrowed to students’ performance and the underlying dynamics without considering the teachers’ role in the performance. What if the teachers’ competences are wanting so, contribute to declines in student performance?  

-          Pedagogical assessments are lacking, there is a need to put them into consideration when making learning analytics

-          I would add contextual analysis as a classifier, because society is dynamic and varied, this the risk for those who make learning analysis to limit learning analytics and its findings to their situation.

In conclusion, the definition above is inclusive but much of the effort in learning analytics has been narrowed to learners and technological data. There is a need, therefore, to expand learning analytics to designs, pedagogies, teacher’s competencies, and context.  

With reference to the above table, I would make any negative judgment on the analytics regarding education. However, I feel the analytics lack the reasons underneath the quantities presented. It, therefore, presents a partial picture that cannot lead to conclusions.

From the article Ferguson (2012), learning analytics: drivers, development and challenges, I have come up with the following key issues that would contextualize the article in Ugandan realities.

⁃   Learning analytics is a huge data driven measurement approach aimed at promoting efficient and effective management of learning and educational processes. It is done by the academic institutions to measure, demonstrate and improve performance.

⁃   Learning analytics is an implementation of social technology to addresses pedagogical issues to using technology so that education becomes functional to address societal issues in the formulation of informed policies. In other words, learning analytics addresses anthropological/sociological behind the production and impact of technology in education.   

⁃  However, while the above is the idea of learning analytics, it is unfortunate that learning analytics have turned out to aim at promoting consumerism drive through new technologies. It turns out that now the consumerists turn educational technologies into business whereby at times, the industry informs the curriculum through financing research and innovations which will compel the education sector to buy from them.

⁃  Precisely learning analytics is a double sharpened sword whose impact depends on the usage and motive. However, I would promote the use of learning analytics for it systematizes the educational process and can enable academic quality assurance and promotion.  

Big data is a term used to describe a collection of data that is huge in size and yet growing over time such that traditional management tools cannot store it. Among this is facebook, twitter, dropbox, amazon and google. The data is categorized into structured, semi-structured and unstructured. The results from the google search on https://www.guru99.com/what-is-big-data.html give the benefits of using big data such as Improved customer service, better operational efficiency, Better Decision Making. I add that to me, big data is used for research, feedback, personal development, skills acquisition, entertainment, and online teaching and learning, benchmarking, window shopping, making comparisons and giving users exposure.

Nearly all professionals and occupations benefit from the use of big data because it avails enough information. In a way, big data helps academics, medics, engineers, architects, agriculturalists BUT most specifically businesspeople. I can argue that big data is an engine that promotes consumerism. No wonder most of the searches give customer interests, products and services, sometimes created out of wanting not need through behavioral manipulation using adverts.

Besides creating unnecessary demands as driven by big data, I see the negative impacts being environmental degradations and toxicities which may cause challenges of sustainability of the future generations. To me in academia, big data limits mental creativity because most learners and scholars run to google, copy and paste even before thinking. In a way, a lot of innovations will be hampered especially in developing countries because the West has already set the pace. It gives challenges of competitiveness and failure to scale up for local products.  Here local knowledge is at stake and we risk keeping in neocolonialism and mental slavery.  

In the tasks of activity 14, am comparing MOOCs, specifically, I have chosen Rhizomatic 15 with an offering from Future learn. In Future learn, I choose an ongoing MOOC course titled Learning Online: Reflecting and sharing, run by the university of Leeds ( https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/reflecting-and-sharing). The course is designed to help learners at school or college to make the transition to studying at university or workplace. On the other hand, Dave, the blogger argues that rhizomatic learning is one story for how we can think about learning and teaching in the complex world (http://davecormier.com/edblog/2015/04/10/a-practical-guide-to-rhizo15/). These two have similarities in technology, pedagogy, and general approach and philosophy. However, they also have remarkable differences as will be presented in the article.

The similarities in technology are that both Rhizomatic 15 and FutureLearn use interactive technologies of web 2.0 including Facebook, Twitter and blogs. However, Neil Moris the Tutor on future learn goes ahead to illustrate the several tools they will use and why as reflected here. “Online  tools for sharing I use a mix of tools: 
* Microsoft Office - especially teams - for work 
* Twitter to engage in politics 
* Facebook to engage with friends and interests 
* Instagram for pictures 
* I will usually play around with new tools as they came onto the market just so I am familiar with them, eg Snapchat, Gab, Pinterest, etc”

On the other hand, Dave the blogger in the Rhizomatic 15, does not stress which technology and why, for he thinks [feels] learning is a very messy place and the story of the rhizome is  one he found super useful in explaining things he has seen happen in learning spaces. He doesn’t justify but uses videos and sketchbooks; perhaps to get sense out of a mess.

For pedagogical comparison between rhizomatic 15 and FutureLearn, I find the later more systematic. Perhaps because the course is also systematic with clear objectives, learning outcomes and course content. The pedagogy used is thus watching videos, joining discussions, reading articles and completing exercises. In assessment, there are short tests and quizzes. For the former, rhizomatic 15 does not have a clear system of pedagogy. Dave refers to this as learning in the new school which involves a lot of interactions with teacher and learners. It uses a lot of collaborative learning, social learning, constructive learning and a lot of networking. Dave refers to this as the community as curriculum and open learning because the teacher learns the learners, learners learn each other and about each other and this turns out to be open learning.

For the general approach and philosophy, I observe that both rhizomatic and FutureLearn use connectivism theory and empower learners through promoting networking by use of collaborative and social learning approaches with the use of interactive technologies and the internet. However, FutureLearn is more teacher-oriented while Rhizomatic 15 is more student-oriented.

This task with its varied activities including; individual exercises, group activities, online meetings, designing a website, Tutor forum has given a real experience of online education. The task has introduced me to several technologies, it has built my confidence and empowered me to start through hands-on activities. It has been challenging because it was my first time with such activities and technologies. For your information, I can now confess that I often messed with our website and struggled to correct. Whenever it happened, it was a sweet but tensing learning opportunity. You needed to know the satisfaction I got after doing right without calling Ed our Team Leader. I will certainly dedicate more time to practice new technologies. Thanks to you all, my Blue Team, you have not left me the same. I will keep referring to the fruits of our work. https://sites.google.com/view/h817bluegroup

https://sites.google.com/view/coventgardentour

Executive summary

According to Kolesnikova (2010), the spread of Internet-based information sources and communication technologies requires educators to rethink their methods and goals in order to maximize the potential of the new opportunities. This is imperative of Uganda as well because of the challenges faced when providing higher education in tertiary and universities. Among these are lack of academic structures, poor infrastructure, lack of books, failure to pay tuition fees as well as social issues related to the family. Providentially, the widespread internet distribution by MTN, Airtel, Africell, Smile, UTL telecommunication companies, communication technologies and mobile devices in Uganda would be used to avail opportunities for higher education for those that qualify using open education (OE). Open education is recommended because study materials and study progress can be easily accessed, assessed, regulated, monitored and facilitated using digital platforms. Moreover, it can be assumed that all the targeted learners own a smartphone or more. Study devices will this not be a challenge.

Taking advantage of Open Educational Resources (OER) and, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) which the academic institutions in developed countries have freely availed to promote all education for all would be an enhancement to Uganda’s higher education.  However, the success of Open education lays on a strong political will which will influence the structural, cultural and agential factors that can enable the adaptation of open education through policy. It is on this basis that this report is addressed to the Uganda National Council for Higher Education (NCHE), which was established to implement the University and Other Tertiary Act of Parliament (2001) as the regulator of higher education. The NCHE is in position to advocate, implement and monitor the establishment of open education in Uganda.

The Transformative Role of Higher Education in National Development

Uganda’s vision is “A Transformed Ugandan Society from a Peasant to a Modern and Prosperous Country within 30 years”. In the country’s vision, core projects have been identified for example a hi-tech city, large irrigation schemes, mining industries, airports, oil and gas, and nuclear power among others. These projects require high skilled human capital, yet the results of the 2014 census showed that it is inadequately skilled labour force (Uganda Bureau of Statistics 2017).

According to the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) (2017), indicate the number of students enrolled in Uganda ‘s tertiary education level, as a percentage of the population of official school age (for the tertiary level) was only four percent. Overall only 11% of the population aged 22-25years had completed tertiary and university education. Moreover, youths (persons 18 – 30 Years) constituted 23% of the total population. Moreover, in the same report, it was observed that those who attained higher education had higher levels of income and opportunities to create jobs. This implies that in order develop, the government of Uganda must invest in higher education.

Commendable efforts have been made in this regard, though have yielded minimal results due to overwhelming challenges and minimal resources invested. In his paper about the challenges facing Universities in Uganda, Ssengendo (2012) enumerates a litany of challenges affecting both public and private universities. These include: lack of funding, shortage of academic staff, demotivated staff, the poor quality of students who lack adequate writing, speaking and social skills, failure to manage human diversity, competition, brain-drain, unprofessional conduct on the part of some staff,  sexual harassment, selling and purchasing of marks,   examination malpractices,  marking the scripts. Poor facilities, lack of adequate lecture rooms, library space, and related academic structures like offices and furniture. These are in addition to high levels of poverty where many students fail to raise tuition fees as well as meeting their basic needs to keep them at university. All these impede universities to give quality education, research, innovation and community services. Given the significance of higher education to national development, it is timely for Uganda to adapt open education for its higher education section because it can mitigate most of the challenges above.

Understanding and Justifying Open Education 

According to Opensource.com (2019), open education is a philosophy about the way people should produce, share, and build on knowledge.  Proponents of open education believe everyone in the world should have access to high-quality educational experiences and resources and they work to eliminate barriers to this goal. Such barriers might include high monetary costs, outdated or obsolete materials, and legal mechanisms that prevent collaboration among scholars and educators. Precisely, open education implies of education for all, open access to programs, open access to courses, open course material, open research and open data. This affirms what Nyaberg (2010) illustrates as being open to a) educational resources, b) learner’s needs, c) learning services, d) teaching efforts and e) employability capabilities development. Open education is effected through OERs and MOOCs.

For Van Damme (2017) Open educational resources are digital learning resources offered online (although sometimes in print) freely and openly to teachers, educators, students, and independent learners in order to be used, shared, combined, adapted, and expanded in teaching, learning and research. They include learning content, software tools to develop, use and distribute, and implementation resources such as open licenses. The learning content is educational material of a wide variety, from full courses to smaller units such as diagrams or test questions. It may include text, images, audio, video, simulations, games, portals and the like. These are used by OER initiatives given by Coursera, BCcampus, Futurelearn and openlearn.

Open education is made possible through an evolution of educational technologies such as projectors, desktop computers, radio, television. The virtual learning environment VLE online tutor forums. Right now, we have mobile learning devices such as cameras, smartphones, laptops and tablets. Through research, open education has adapted more interactive technologies which combine some technologies and can allow groups to work spontaneously from different spaces at their convenience. Among these are padlet, thinglink, Web.2.0 facebook, Whatsapp, twitter, blogs.

Not different from the traditional face-to-face system, open educations pedagogy is informed and informs learning approaches of cooperative learning, constructive learning, individual learning, collaborative learning. All these are informed through learning theories of cognitive, connectivism, behaviour and social constructivism theories. It is for this reason that open education operates in a cycle, especially at the level of OER. Hodgkinson-Williams, & Arinto (2017) show that OER is a component of open education cycle which is comprised of:

1.      Conceptualisation phase (planning what OER and which pedagogical strategies are most suitable for which context)

2.      A Creation phase ( development of original material for self use)

3.      Use phase (use or “locate” modified),

4.      Adoption phase (being customised, revised or modified or both. Remixed with more than one set of OER)

From the above image, we can affirm that open education does not in any way compromise academic quality. It is critically designed and regulated through creative commons licenses. On the introduction of OER in Uganda, it would be ideal to use of the creative commons license called Attribute-ShareAlike 2.0. Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0). Under this license, one can share (copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. The OER in this arrangement can also be adapted (remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms if one follows the license terms of attribution and share-alike. I recommend this CC license because, through attribution, it ensures the required academic quality by preventing the temptation to plagiarise. It also allows commercial use whereby based on the intensified need for OER, through the UNCHE, private practitioners can be engaged and regulated in reproducing and distributing to remote areas at a subsidized fee. This would promote innovations and job creation to the remote areas where otherwise nobody would be motivated thus excluding the rural areas from participation in open education.  Besides it is a tendency of Ugandans to value and sustain something they have spent money on, than not.  Furthermore, based on the study in Portugal’s public universities, it was found that academic staff want to be acknowledged when they have produced OERs (Cardoso, Morgado, Teixeira, 2019). The acknowledgment in Uganda is also a basis for academic promotion, the chosen licence would motivate staff and build scholarship but also promote academic mobility.

Benefits of Open Education

Open education if adapted in Uganda would enable many potential candidates that qualify for tertiary or university education to get a quality education. Similar challenges in Uganda were prevalent in New York City where 54% of the students in the City University of New York (CUNY) qualified for financial aid because were from the minority and poor groups. However, with the adaptation of OER pedagogical approaches by introducing Zero Textbook Costs (ZTC) courses, many students were able to save money and spend on other costs to keep them in school. The student confessed to accessing OER on their mobile devices and improving in their academic performances.  The adaptation of OER through ZTC, enabled the university to save $9.5m and impacted 76000 students in the first year of the project. Moreover, they were targeting 260000 students in the second year of the project (Brandle, Katz, Hays, et al 2019). This success story of Open Education Practices (OEP) would be benchmarked to Uganda and would solve many problems and enable more students to get higher education.

Kolesnikov (2010) urges that open education is good for people who seek to; upgrade the level of their professional and general education, to acquire an education of the needed level by enrolling in any educational institution of the open type, as well as  maintain one’s ability to compete in the labor market. Faced with the challenges of universities in Uganda, adoption of Open education would be helpful in various courses. This is because open education integrates formal education, informal education, continuous education, professional education apprenticeship and edutainment. Society being dynamic, open education provides room for continuous learning to update knowledge, skills.

It also allows one to get exposed to international affairs and approaches. It also avails room for self-study, especially in languages. Often times, Ugandans have been limited due to lack of knowledge of another foreign language except English. This denies them opportunities to work the United Nations or in other countries which are not anglophone. With open education, enthusiastic students may learn other foreign languages like French, Spanish, Chinese through self-study. This has been successful in a South University of Thailand, where students use Tell-Me-More (TMM) a language learning technology to teach themselves English. Although the study indicate that the students needed a lot of self-discipline to learn and master the language, to the extent that some did not achieve their goals, several were proud they succeeded (Gyamfi, Sukseemuang,  Tantiwich, and  Kaewkong,  2019).  Through self, study, the students will add value to themselves out of their own initiative. This implies that if adapted, Ugandan human resource would be open to working in another country, thus promote labour mobility, increase on the possibility for foreign income exchange and well as benchmarking technologies that can improve on the country’s development.  Open education is not limited to students alone, it is equally beneficial to staff especially academic staff.

For academic staff, OE allows access to global networks which are good to benchmark and share modern pedagogical, research and publication skills.  Open education leads to the emergence of new kinds of professional and pedagogical activity and new specialties. It is on this basis that Van Damme (2015) urges that OER support innovative pedagogies through changing the role of learners from passive consumers to active producers, fostering peer-to-peer learning, stimulating problem-based learning, enriching learning resources through collaborative practice and enhancing the social and emotional context of learning.

Policy Factors enabling the creation, use, adaptability of open education

Orr, Rimini and Van Damme (2015) argue that policy support is necessary for OER to reach their full potential as a social innovation. To this aim, policymakers should focus on the OER funding, OER use, the regulations for their production and providing a central repository for openly licensed OER. In Uganda, despite the significant of OER in solving challenges of higher education, without the political will, it is unlikely that OE can be sufficiently adopted. In the same way, Hodgkinson-Williams, and Arinto  (2017) also present factors  influencing OER as are 1) structural factors,  2) cultural factors and agential factors as illustrated in image below:

From the above image, we can affirm that although open education appears to solve many problems in the traditional system, it is important to note that it is not a magic bullet. It will only be functional until some factors are in place to enable availability, use, and sharing of OER. Among these are:  Infrastructure (ICT, Internet connectivity, electricity), financial resources human resource, ongoing research, educational technology networks, educational technologies logistics, publicity, the right attitude, good governance, ethical behavior, functional stakeholders’ networks e.g. ministry of education, education institutions, industry, and NGOs, Public service and employers. The UNCHE, therefore, must devise strategies to ensure publicize the advantages of open education, its justification as an alternative paradigm as well as making a proper design for its adaption, implementation and monitoring. As an innovation in the education sector, it is important to benchmark open education practices from other countries in order to minimize the risks or mitigate them. 

Risks of Open Education

Based on the context of Russia,  Kolesnikova (2010), observes that  despite the benefits of open education,  having open access to the international educational space also increases the degree of professional and personality risks. The fact that open education automatically implies internationality, Uganda needs to take caution on these risks for it is not immune. The other danger Uganda would have it that there is a possibility of taking on old models which developed countries dropped due to several challenges. This would be the first risk that Uganda should watch out. Other risks as presented which Uganda would also suffer are: Information overload, temptations for various kinds of cultural expansion, loss of loss of focus (globalization versus localization debate) and culture shock from the encounter with educational practices on a fundamentally different level

There is also uncritical borrowing of educational models without consideration of existing traditions and possible consequences that can lead to the destruction of one’s own cultural identity.

The syndrome of project network “dependency,” a habit of constantly taking part in all kinds of international educational demonstrations and events as an end. It has been observed that in some universities, the staff does not give physical presence for they are more on travel than in class. This is fatigue but also compromise academic quality though, in reality, these movements make the university profile ranking higher. It may be beneficial to the university but not allow learners to benefit from the availability of their lecturer.

There is a risk, on the nature of information shared. Since time immemorial, all communities have had secluded information that can be accessed through socially acceptable ways such as initiation, ordination, circumcision, and graduation. However, in OER, such information is not clearly protected and perhaps might lead to abuse or misuse.

The other risk is a failure to ensure quality whereby teachers are not trained in open education practices, which may lead to challenges of methodological confusion.  This will be made worse by unfortunate realities of most lecturers not being sure of their tenure. The majority are part-time or on contract, therefore, this uncertainty makes most of them pre-occupied by thinking about means of survival. It is unlikely that such the academic staff will do the needful to develop, use, or remix OER. This was already found by Hodgkinson-Williams, & Arinto (2017) who carried out empirical research and found out that adoption and use of OER in the global south is already lacking as presented in the image below.

With the above observation in the image, it is possible to open education will not be contextualised, to solve local problems and may not thus contribute to national development.  The UNCHE ought to influence the availability of funding, human resource acquisition, and other basic infrastructure if open education is to be adapted and to be functional.  

Conclusion and the way forward

In a recap, it is important to acknowledge that open education is the way to go for Uganda’s high education.  In Uganda, open education is timely because the country has potentials for its use, yet it is facing many challenges in the traditional face-to-face system that impede the provision of quality higher education. Moreover, other sectors which are also important in development such as roads, agriculture, construction, security, health, all demand money on the national budget.  It is based on this that the UNCHE should advocate for open education because as the case was in City University in New York ZTC courses, even in Uganda, some reasonable amount of money will initially be invested in the project but in the short time, a lot of saving will be realized and more learners will benefit. In this, there will be minimizing costs and maximizing academic services and output. We need to acknowledge that based on the significance of education in the formation of human capital and workforce, education needs to be given priority in funding because this investment will give a direct impact to other sectors. As observed early in literature, open education can only be implemented successfully through political will. Despite a few risks, I can affirm that the benefits outweigh the risks. Moreover, the risks would perhaps be avoided if the UNCHE learned from the literature and the OEP of other countries that adapted OE before introducing it to Uganda.  

 References

Bates, T. (2015), ‘What do we mean by open in education?’ [Online].https://www.tonybates.ca/2015/02/16/what-do-we-mean-by-open-in-education/ (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

BCcampus, https://open.bccampus.ca/ (Accessed 15^th May 2019)

Brandle, S., Katz, S., Hays, et al (2019) ‘But What Do The Students Think: Results of the CUNY Cross-Campus Zero-Textbook Cost Student Survey’. Open Praxis, vol. 11 issue 1, January–March 2019, pp. 85–101[Online]. https://openpraxis.org/index.php/OpenPraxis/article/download/956/525 (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

Cardoso, P. Morgado, L, Teixeira, A., (2019) ‘Open Practices in Public Higher Education in Portugal: Faculty Perspectives’. Open Praxis, vol. 11 issue 1, January–March 2019, pp. 55–70[Online]. https://openpraxis.org/index.php/OpenPraxis/article/download/956/525 (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

Coursera https://www.coursera.org/ (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

Future learn https://www.futurelearn.com/ (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

 Gyamfi, G.,  Sukseemuang, P.,  Tantiwich, K., Kaewkong, P.,  (2019) ‘Self-Study with the Educational Technology Tell Me More: What EFL Learners do’ . Open Praxis, vol. 11 issue 1, January–March 2019, pp. 103–116 [Online]. https://openpraxis.org/index.php/OpenPraxis/article/download/956/525 (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

Hodgkinson-Williams, C. & Arinto, P. B. (2017) Adoption and impact of OER in the Global South. Cape Town & Ottawa: African Minds, International Development Research Centre & Research on Open Educational Resources.

Kolesnikova, A.  (2010) ‘The Prospects, Challenges, and Risks of Open Education’, Russian Education & Society, 52:6, 3-20.

Nyaberg, D.  (2010) The Philosophy of Open Education. New York: Routledge.

Open University of UK. https://www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses (Accessed 15^th May 2019)

Orr, D., Rimini, M.  and  Van Damme, D.  (2015) Open Educational Resources: A Catalyst for Innovation, Educational Research and Innovation, OECD Publishing, Paris.

Ronald, M., (2016) ‘Open Education and the Hidden Tariff. In: OEGlobal 2016: Convergence through Collaboration’, 12-14 of Apr, Krakow, Poland.

Ssengendo, A.,  (2012) Challenges Facing Universities in Uganda in UVCF BULLETIN VOLUME 1  [P.17- 39] https://uvcf.ac.ug/images/UVCF1.pdf (Accessed 15^th May 2019).

On the introduction of OER in Uganda, I would recommend to use of the creative commons licence called Attribute-ShareAlike 2.0. Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0). Under this licence, one can share (copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. The OER in this arrangement can also be adapted (remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms if one follows the licence terms of attribution and share-alike. I recommend this CC licence because, through attribution, it ensures the required academic quality by preventing the temptation to plagiarise. It also allows commercial use whereby based on the intensified need for OER, private practitioners can be engaged and regulated in reproducing and distributing to remote areas at a subsidized fee. This would promote innovations and job creation to the remote areas where otherwise nobody would be motivated thus excluding the rural areas from participation in open education.  Besides it is a tendency of Ugandans to value and sustain something they have spent money on, than not.  Furthermore, based on the study in Portugal’s public universities, it was found that academic staff want to be acknowledged when they have produced OERs (Cardoso, Morgado, Teixeira, 2019). The acknowledgement in Uganda is also a basis for academic promotion, the chosen licence would motivate staff and build scholarship but also promote academic mobility.

1.      Tracing the Need of eLearning Innovations in Karamoja

According to the UNDP (2015), education provides knowledge, skills, values, attitudes, and behaviors that are inputs for human development. The government of Uganda thus established Universal Primary and Secondary Education to enable education for all. However, in the Karamoja, chances towards this goal are minimal due to the nomadic culture of regular movement in search of pasture and cattle grabbing using guns which cause insecurity. This impeded service delivery, making it the poorest region in the country (Brown, Kelly and Mabugu 2017).  However, with the disarmament programme, the guns were withdrawn, but boys are withdrawn from schools to rear cows while girls as early as 12 years are forced to marry in order to get cows from bride price. Moreover, without education, it is unlikely that the situation will change at the current rate of enrolment of 33.7% primary and 10% secondary.  The government primary school accessibility in 5km is 4.7% while for secondary school is 74.9%. This calls for innovations that promote education. This paper will evaluate the Alternative Basic Education for Karamoja (ABEK) Programme with the aim of streamlining it through eLearning innovations to make it functional.  

 2.      Conceptualizing Innovation in eLearning

In the diffusion of innovation, Flichy (2007) gives an understanding of innovation as the use of technology to minimize input and maximize in performing a task. Innovation in education is understood as the use of technology to generate, process, document and disseminate knowledge. This brings us to the broad term educational technology which according to Mangal (2009) include teaching, instructional, behavioral, and instructional design technology. I would add “humanware” to emphasize usages and rules attached.

 Mangal (2009) further presents the characteristics of teaching which justify the use of innovation in teaching as presented in the image below. 

Based on the image above, it is important to note that now, teaching need to be innovative at design and pedagogical level in order to meet the learning and teaching objectives.

 3.0. Evaluating ABEK Through eLearning Innovations

Based on the nomadic realities of Karamoja, in 1998, the ministry of education introduced ABEK as informal open and mobile education to bridge learners to the formal system. This was to counteract the rejection of formal education which would keep the children away from household chores and cattle rearing. As an open education, ABEK removed unnecessary restrictions to learning, including timing, adherence to English language, methods and school uniforms. This was the beginning of innovation in education to allow the Karimojong start formal education. However, the programme failed to deliver and was ignored. Based on the knowledge, skills and literature acquired in H817, this paper hypothetically gives advice to the Ministry of Education in Uganda on how ABEK can be open, innovative and beneficial to fulfil the mission of education. Below are three examples of innovative technologies to promote education in Karamoja.

3.1. Digital Study Hall  

Digital Study Hall (DSH) is a Facilitated Video Instruction for primary school education in low resource settings.  Anderson (2012) observes that low quality primary schools are substantial obstacles to improving livelihoods of people in developing countries.  The specific intervention is Facilitated Video Instruction, where lessons of experienced teachers are shown in rural schools by local teachers. The teachers are instructed to alternate between playing the video and conducting activities with students.  The goal is for students to benefit from the expert video materials and personal interaction with a teacher. In the DSH, the content is not limited to cognitive education, it also includes community-based education in areas of primary health care, human rights, gender relations, microfinance and well as social relations.

 The DSH is still existing moreover working in almost similar situations like ABEK in Uganda where the learning centres were officially ‘mobile’, with the facilitators following the kraal and, if necessary, willing to stay at the kraal. During the ABEK, many children were enrolled, and later joined the formal system (Krätli 2009). ABEK was also open to community members and was used as a platform for community mobilization, acquisition of skills in literacy and numeracy, agriculture, peace and conflict resolution and well as ecological systems. However, in the Strategic Review of 2009, Krätli does not indicate there whether there was some effort to use innovations by use of advanced technologies like facilitated videos instructions. The ABEK just continued with traditional means of open education and did not do any benchmarking.

DSH approach is ideal in Karamoja because it favours remote areas which are isolated, marginalized with low means of service delivery. Here the Karamoja teachers and community can benefit from knowledge from advanced teachers in urban and well facilitated schools. The communities too can benefit from strategies or success stories from other communities. For instance, a documentary about Yacouba Sawadogu a man who stopped the dessert can help in solving a problem of semi-desert conditions, famine and joblessness that the Karimojong suffer.

3.2. Use of Open Educational Resources for Karamoja

According to Damme (2017) Open educational resources (OER) are digital learning resources offered online (although sometimes in print) freely and openly to teachers, educators, students, and independent learners in order to be used, shared, combined, adapted, and expanded in teaching, learning and research. They include learning content, software tools to develop, use and distribute, and implementation resources such as open licenses. The learning content is educational material of a wide variety, from full courses to smaller units such as diagrams or test questions. It may include text, images, audio, video, simulations, games, portals and the like.

EDUCAUSE (2019) presents a resource website of   related to open educational resources (OER) in higher education. The Website with OER resources includes: The Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources, OpenStax, Free online course materials, MIT Open courseware, The Open course library, OER common, Open education resource foundation, WikiEducator, The World Digital Library and Future Learn.

Damme (2017) ungues that there are many benefits for educators and learners which can arise from creating, sharing and utilising OERs in student education. Besides being cost effective in terms of time and costs, among others are enabling student experience through accessing media-rich materials, promoting digital literacy and promoting visibility of profiles of those that create the OERs. OERs also promote the academic profile of the institutions that provide them and improve their academic ranking. On the side of learners, OER help in changing the role of learners from passive consumers to active producers, fostering peer-to-peer learning, stimulating problem-based learning, enriching learning resources through collaborative practice and Enhancing the social and emotional context of learning. This innovation is ideal for Karamoja because it solves challenges that appear in traditions education system of; lack of library space, library materials, transportation, and time limitation.

3.3. Social Media  

 According to Faizi and Abdellatif El Afia et al (2013) and (Brown and Adler 2008),  social media are categories of interactive technologies which includes a) social network sites like Facebook, Ning, MySpace and Twitter that serve as online communities via which users connect with friends or colleagues and share ideas and resources, b) content sharing and organizing sites like Delicious, Digg, Flickr, YouTube, Dailymotion and RSS readers and c)  content creation and editing websites such as Blogger, Google Docs, Wikipedia and WordPress. However, the features and functions of a social media network can overlap, making a tool appropriate for more than one category. In week 4, group C I learnt new technologies of padlets and Thinglink which allow to use several social media concurrently, thus taking care of diversity of choice on a single task.  This would be good for education theory by putting into consideration the behaviorism, cognitivism, constructionism and connectivism theories to guide the practice of teaching and learning.

In practice, social media are collaborative platforms, communication channels, tools of engagement, links learners to employers, builds a profile, evaluate character and causes social responsibility through consciousness. Social media too favors the Karimojong character of being mobile, this can be used on mobile devices like phones, laptops, and tablets. In addition, like all parts of Uganda, Karamoja has a pyramid population structure with the majority under the age of 30 and are referred to as the “.com generation”. Thus, they would adopt social media technologies with enthusiasm which is very good for learning.

3.      Conclusion.

Based on the above, propose the three innovations of the DSH, Social media and OER in eLearning will empower Karimojong and keep them abreast with international affairs, which is good for learning. This exposure will break the cluster of disadvantages of poverty, illiteracy, vulnerability, and powerlessness. However, this is a learning experience calls for Gibbs’ reflective cycle of evaluating ABEK (Dye (2011, p. 230). The policymakers and implementors of ABEK should benchmark from DSH, OER, and Social media innovations to redesign the approach if it is to be successful.  

References:

Arboleda, A.M,   Introducing Open Educational Resources Https://Www.Futurelearn.Com/Courses/Blended-Learning-Getting-Started/0/Steps/7860 (Accessed on 24th March 2019).

Brown. V, Kelly, M, and Mabugu, T.  (2017) The Education System in Karamoja. HEART High-Quality Technical Assistance for Results): Oxford.

Damme, D.V,  (2017) Open Educational Resources: A Catalyst For Innovation In Education Https://Www.Open-Science-Conference.Eu/Wp-Content/Uploads/2016/02/Vandamme_Open-Educational-Resources-A-Catalyst-For-Innovation-In-Education-Berlin-Open-Science-Conference-22-March-2017.Pdf (Accessed On 24th/3/2019)

Dye, V. (2011) ‘Reflection, Reflection, Reflection. I’m thinking all the time, why do I need a theory or model of reflection?’, in McGregor, D. and Cartwright, L. (ed.) Developing Reflective Practice: A guide for beginning teachers. Maidenhead: McGraw-Hill Education (pp. 217-234).

EDUCAUSE (2019) Https://Library.Educause.Edu/Topics/Teaching-And-Learning/Open-Educational-Resources-Oer (Accessed On 24th/3/2019)

Faizi, R, Abdellatif El Afia  etal (2013) Exploring the Potential Benefits of Using Social Media In Education Ijep ‒ Volume 3, Issue 4, October 2013.

 Flichy, P, (2007) Understanding Technological Innovation: A Socio-technical Approach, Northampton, Edward Elger Publishing limited.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r35WBadI7Ik
Krätli, S. (2009) Alternative Basic Education for Karamoja Strategic Review Final report to Save the Children in Uganda, Kampala.

Mangal, S. K. (2009)   Essentials of Educational Technology, New Delhi, HPI Learning Private Limited.

McAndrew, Patrick and Farrow, Robert (2013) Open education research: from the practical to the theoretical. In: McGreal, Rory; Kinuthia, Wanjira and Marshall, Stewart eds. Open Educational Resources: Innovation, Research and Practice. Vancouver, Canada: Commonwealth of Learning and Athabasca University, pp. 65–78.

Uganda Bureau of Statistics (2017) Uganda National Household Survey 2016/17,  Kampala.

 In this way, Siemens (2005) in the theory of connectivism argues that nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning. And the ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is a core skill. In the digital era learning, it appears everyone and everything learns and is taught simultaneously thus a need for full time connectiveness to allow this inclusiveness. I have a feeling, the rules of the theory of connectivism at times surpasses or challenges the traditional norms of education and learning. Among these are matters of copyright, tuition fee and student identity. The flow in and out of the networks and phases which are not definite cannot allow extreme structures. It is based on this reality that the OU module of H817 of Innovations and Openness in eLearning comes in handy. It is handy because it keeps the supremacy of the curriculum but also glorify technology and  connectivity in learning.