Update: This program has been discontinued. We are very proud of the projects were be able to support and inspired by the people we met. Thank you to Steel Wagstaff, Apurva Ashok, and Amy Song for all their help.
March 16th was the first week our office went home to work. Because much of the work we do is already online, we were fortunate to have a relatively easy shift. Our activities continued as normal (we’re zoom pros), but there was still this strange sense that we weren’t reacting to the moment. Rebus is about community, so it’s important to us to offer support to people that responds to this moment.
We reached out to our colleagues at Pressbooks to develop a package, with offerings from both Rebus and Pressbooks, that would leverage the power of OER to ease the shift to online instruction. Thus Open & Online was born.
Here’s what we’re offering:
Rebus is offering free weekly community gatherings on a theme related to open textbooks as courseware and online collaboration.
Pressbooks is offering a free book on a shared instance of PressbooksEDU to participants of Open & Online.
If you have an open textbook you want to adapt into an online course, if you have a course you need to move online and are interested in open access, come learn with us. Rebus will offer three opportunities per week (set to account for multiple time zones as we are facing these challenges all around the world) for educators to gather, discuss, and share knowledge. Sessions are 30 minutes and consist of 10 minutes of instruction and 20 minutes of discussion. Participants are not expected to come to every gathering, but are invited to every session.
The first sessions are as follows:
Week 1 March 31-April 3 Leveraging OER as Courseware
Opportunities to drop in: April 1 @ 1pm ET/ 5pm UTC | April 2 @ 5pm ET/ 9pm UTC | April 3 @ 9:30am ET/ 1:30pm UTC
Week 2 April 6-10 Video Conference Facilitation of Large and Small Groups
Opportunities to drop in: April 8 @ 1pm ET/ 5pm UTC and April 10 @ 9:30am ET/ 1:30pm UTC
During the first two weeks we’ll listen to the needs of the group in order to determine further topics. Some ideas: Interactive Learning with H5P, Annotating with Hypothesis, Modular Content, Collaboration Online, Intro to Accessibility.
Who is this for?
Faculty and librarians with a specific open textbook they would like to make more interactive or engaging, or with a specific course they want to move online with the help of open educational resources. Participants should have a specific project that they want to work on in mind, whether it’s an existing text or course. New to open education, an old hat—everyone is welcome to come ask questions and share knowledge.
Please note: If the number of participants becomes too much for our resources, we will cap the number. Thanks for understanding.
Next steps:
Fill out this form to sign up.
Questions? Email contact(at)rebus.community