Category: News

United Nations goes open source

United Nations Technology Innovation Labs (UNTIL) has started developing new open source strategy and policy. Last month (October 2019), a new advisory board had their first in-person meeting in Helsinki in the UNTIL offices. Frank Karlitschek found this initiative remarkable for several reasons:

  • Sharing: The United Nations wants to have a positive impact on everyone on this planet. For that goal, it is important that software, data, and services are available for everyone independent of their language, budget, education, or other factors. Open source is perfect to guarantee that result.
  • Contributing: It should be possible that everyone can contribute to the software, data, and services of the United Nations. The goal is to not depend on a single software vendor alone, but instead, build a bigger ecosystem that drives innovation together.
  • Empowering: Open source makes it possible for underdeveloped countries and regions to foster local companies and expertise by building on top of existing open source software—standing on the shoulders of giants.
  • Sustainability: Open source guarantees more sustainable software, data, and services by not relying on a single entity to support, maintain, and develop it. Open source helps to avoid a single point of failure by creating an equal playing field for everyone.
  • Security: Open source software is more secure than proprietary software because the code can be constantly reviewed and audited. This fact is especially important for security-sensitive applications that require transparency and openness.
  • Decentralization: An open source strategy enables decentralized hosting of software and data. This fact makes it possible to be compliant with all data protection and privacy regulations and enables a more free and open internet.

Read more about it in Frank’s article here.

Image credits: Jason Baker. CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: Cloud, Globe. Both CC0.

Meet Colectic

Colectic (formerly known as El Teb) is a non-profit cooperative that works for the inclusion, autonomy and empowerment of people and communities in the social, labour and technological fields. We understand and use technology as a tool for participation and social transformation. We work to promote universal access to ICT, by training and accompanying groups, social organizations and organizations from the Social and Solidarity Economy.

  • What is the background of colectic in open and free technologies? 

We believe that the technology is a just a tool -a very good one- to promote autonomy and help people to be empowered; that’s why we work to promote universal access to ICT by providing training opportunities and accompanying social groups and organizations within the use of the technological services, tools and sources, and to be able to develop their own potential.

We work into the social and solidarity economy (the opposite to the private and governed by capitalist logics one) and, as a consequence, we’re committed to encourage citizens to be creative and not just consumers  of technology, to be capable of manage the sources they need to find answers to their own needs and motivations. We promote FLOSS, open software and hardware, because we believe that technology must be a common good, guaranteed and non-exclusive in the knowledge society.

In this sense, Colectic offers and favours learning spaces in groups, in the community, and in the exploration of this type of technologies (such as our digital laboratory RavalFab -where people learn to learn how to do digital manufacturing or our Omnia Room -a computers room that we dedicate to digital literacy). We not only do it in our territory, the Raval neighborhood of the city of Barcelona, but we also do an important job advising, training and providing technical assistance to telecentre networks (digital training centres), and especially to the profiles of the decision makers of the local and regional administrations and to digital facilitators and trainers.

  • Can you highlight any projects or initiatives your organisation has done in open culture or free software? How do you see your organisation contributing to the open movement? 

Besides offering learning spaces and consulting, advise and assessment, we have performed different migrations of computer’s operating system (from private networks of computers to open software network of computers), websites, productivity programs, etc. We have a long trajectory of accompaniment in the migration to free program to social entities too.

We also work on the advocacy level, as we promote the Floss culture by publishing different articles in a web page dedicated to social entities and volunteers  (see http://xarxanet.org/etiquetes/general/sobirania-tecnologica)

Colectic also co-organize the TecnoFESC (a fair) an space where you can find the main entities, cooperatives and companies that work in the technological world from a point of view of solidarity economy.  Through TecnoFESC you can learn to promote open, free and neutral telecommunications, sustainable management and revaluation of computer equipment and public procurement responsible for electronic equipment to improve working conditions in producing countries. You will also find providers of technological services of the social and solidarity economy and drivers of technological pro-communication and will include the strategic use of telecommunications for the development of social justice. If you’re at Barcelona from 25 to 27 October 2019, you will be very welcome.

  • What challenges with integrating free software and open source in the training of low-skills adults came up in your research? 

Colectic’ focus group participants in the OPEN-AE project are people who are specially sensitized to the use of open technologies and open resources. In the focus group challenges emerged and were discussed on how to integrate open source and free technologies in the trianings of low skilled adults. The trainers are considered to be part of a group of privileged people who, through individual and self-directed learning strategies, have accessed a set of relevant knowledge in this environment. They promote and use this type of resources intensively.

The participants are aware that, to this day, the Catalan telecentre network (formed by more than 400 centres, more than half of them based on the exclusive use of the free and open software) uses free software for training. However, they are sceptical about the adherence of their colleagues and, especially, of the people in charge (management staff of the centres and telecentre networks project management staff) of the training centres.

In their opinion, companies, citizens and administration are very reluctant to adopt this type of open software and open educational resources.

It is necessary to generate a good curriculum based on open technologies and resources and generate strategies to keep it updated on a permanent basis, to avoid that the curriculum becomes obsolete with the passage of time.

On the other hand, they consider it is necessary the curriculum to be complete (include resources for all areas of competences) and that it must be accompanied by a guide of recommendations for its adoption. Especially institutions and governments should find it easy to implement.

  • What do you hope from the open-ae project? 

We hope we will find an easy path to help people, collectives and governments to use and promote FLOSS. Building an international community will help, for sure.

Meet Ynternet.org!

Created in 1998, Ynternet.org is a Swiss foundation located in Geneva. Since the beginning we have been working to promote eCulture, namely good citizenship practices and digital literacy in the digital age. We are a team of experts, researchers and teachers, who are involved in training centers, international research and innovation programs, events (conferences, workshops, hackathons) and publications. With a strong Free license / software culture and online collaborative attitude, Ynternet.org have at its core values the knowledge sharing, digital native cultures, folksonomy, wikinomy and online collaboration. We are a research and education center promoting an efficient and ethical use of the technology, while having a responsible behaviour in the digital environment.

We have a passion for disruptive innovation (the TEDxGeneva conferences are one example of that) and Wikis (we love Wikis and Wiki-like platforms). Ynternet.org is working on commons oriented netizenship based on free and open source software, open licensing and we have a collaborative book (see more at http://www.ynternet.org/page/livre and http://netizen3.org/index.php) that explains their fundamentals.

  1. What if the background of Ynternet.org in free and open source (FLOSS) technologies? 

We have been campaigning for more ethical and socially conscious internet and technological usage for many years. We frequently go to schools and universities to raise awareness and promote the intentional usage of digital devices as well as advocating for the open culture movement (see more at http://www.ynternet.org/page/tous-citoyens-du-net ). Our latest campaign included open session with Richard Stallman who previously had a TEDxGeneva talk and is a member of the Ynternet.org scientific committee.

We have organised all our experience and expertise on collaborative competences around our WikiSkills Handbook: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/WikiSkills_Handbook a practical guide to help educators of all types (teachers, trainers, facilitators) to bring their students to use wikis and wiki-like tools for their learning activities. 

Last but not least, we have a strategic partnership with the University of Applied Sciences in Geneva (HES/HEG-GE) where we organize yearly trainings for Professors and Assistants on licensing (FLOSS models and tools). We frequently participate in local events, conferences and seminars on the topics of free and open licenses, targeting a more ethical and socially conscious internet through copyleft and the creative commons licences, online collaboration in the workplace and active citizenship. These interventions are open to various target groups including professionals, activists, job seekers and youth.

  1. Can you highlight any projects or initiatives your organisation has done in open culture or free software? How do you see your organisation contributing to the open movement? 

Earlier this year, we received in Switzerland Richard M. Stallman, one of the main initiator and key figure of  the free software movement and the GNU / Linux, Copyleft, digital commons (ie Wikipedia, open and open source software). In the era of ethical issues and digital sustainability, the Ynternet.org Foundation organized a conference tour of one of its flagship members, the co-founder of the free software movement and the philosophy of digital ethics. We hosted a number of different conferences with the precursor to open data and open educational resources (open educational resources) in different cities around Switzerland.

Our work in the FLOSS movement includes research efforts on collaborative applications development such as CoWaBoo (http://project.cowaboo.net), collective awareness on FLOSS Culture, (our observatory is available online at (https://groups.diigo.com/group/e_culture), FLOSS culture and eHealth activities, (see more at http://www.ehospital-project.net/docs/Publication_eHospital_long_EN.pdf) and an open ePorfolio methodology and platform (see more at http://www.ageneve.net/wp-content/uploads/guide_eportfolio_v03.pdf). In the last 5 years we have coordinated different Erasmus + LLP  projects, like the Wikiskills and the Wikinomics (http://www.wikinomics-project.eu) efforts, participated in several others and coordinating the TEDxGeneva project (www.tedxgeneva.net).

Currently we are one of the partners developing the Open AE project, but we are also developing another two Erasmus + projects (ICT4theElderly and DIMESCA) that have at their very core the ideas and values of the free and open culture movement.

Most importantly, we have developed international collaborations with the  Wikimedia and Orange Foundations, resulting to specific activities:

  1. What challenges with integrating free software and open source in the training of low-skills adults came up in your research? What do you hope from the open-ae project?

Our moto can be summarized as follows:  

“the road is long but the future is free (FLOSS)”.

We consider OPEN-AE as a golden opportunity to document and disseminate FLOSS culture throughout Europe. As our current OPEN-AE research demonstrates  there is a lot to be done on creating awareness among digital users regarding what the FLOSS culture movement. The vast majority of people is still not familiarized with concepts like copyleft licenses, open and free software and what it is to be a netizen in general. It is crucial to multiply the efforts and projects promoting FLOSS related digital skills while creating awareness that being collaborative, responsible and ethical in the internet is possible, and that this is exactly the way to preserve and push for an open and citizen driven internet.

Open Source Codes and the Challenge of the SDGs: An UNTIL Interview with Amanda Brock

United Nations Technology Innovation Labs (UNTIL) published an interview with Amanda Brock, head of the Advisory Group UNTIL established to address question of how least developed countries can access expensive computer software.

Amanda Brock has a deep experience in this area. Along with her role with UNTIL she is the European Representative of the world’s biggest defensive patent pool, the Open Invention Network and CEO of the Trustable open source project. Furthermore she is a Fellow of the OpenForum Academy, a member of OASIS Standards Open Advisory Board, a founding editor of the Journal of Open Law, Technology and Society.

Previously she was General Counsel of Canonical, one of the world’s biggest open source companies and commercial sponsor of Ubuntu, setting up its global legal team in 2008 and running this for 5 years. She has worked as a tech lawyer for over 20 years, specializing in open source for over a decade.

You can read the interview here.

Image credit and source: United Nations Technology Innovation Labs

How to #OpenAE?

The Open AE: Promote open source technologies in non-formal adult education (OPEN-AE) project will be presented at the ALL DIGITAL Summit in Bologna on October 10-11th. The How to Workshop will give participants, who will mostly be from the digital inclusion sector practical and hands on exercises to better understand how to participate in open-source and free software cultures (hint: you can be active in the field even if you are not an IT developer).

The project consortium feels committed to bridging the Free, Libre and Open Source Software gap in the digital inclusion sector and makes no assumption that this is a easy task. Bottom up research conducted by desk research and focus groups show that many feel they are not skilled enough to be active free and open source software users. The how-to workshop aims to put into perspective these doubts and give clear hands on techniques to start participating in the open software culture, share your work with open licenses and benefit and contribute to the work of others.

The how-to workshop will take place as part of the ALL DIGITAL Summit in Bologna, it will be hosted on the 11th of October from 11:45 to 13:15

Programme

Meet the Association Study Center City of Foligno

The Association Study Center City of Foligno (www.cstudifoligno.it) is a training agency active since the year 2000 in the territory of the Municipality of Foligno. The Association is a non-profit private organization whose funding members are the Municipality of Foligno, the Province of Perugia, the Umbria Region, the University of Perugia and the Foundation of the local bank.

CSF has worked with and for different target groups, always starting from the assumption that a high-quality education and training are fundamental to the whole realization of the individual. “Education for all”, in our case, has meant in particular the realization of training courses and other formative interventions for disadvantaged groups. Unemployment, handicap, gender and racial discrimination, from one side, have been dismantled with adaptability, guidance and social inclusion, from the other side.

Our main activity is the constant research of local, national and community funds, for two main reasons:

1)  It answers to the needs and problems of people who live in Foligno and in the surrounding areas

2)  It connects people with a wider educational and working context, with the aim to favor an intercultural comparison and dialogue for the development of the person and of the society in general

We constantly try to deepen a real transnational cooperation in the field of adult education, increase awareness of European cooperation and opportunities and help young adults in finding their role in the everyday life.

We have a long-term experience in European projects, both as a coordinating and as a partner organization.

With regards to adult learners, we benefit from the European Social Fund for the delivery of continuous and permanent training intervention. Moreover, starting from 2010, we have implemented, both as project coordinator and partner, several Grundtvig multilateral projects (LLP) and Erasmus+ KA2 Strategic partnerships for Adults.

All these activities allowed us to strengthen our connection with other local and international organizations that provide services for the elders, such as:

–           The University of the Third Age of Foligno

–           CPIA: regional center for adult education

–           EPALE: Electronic Platform for Adult Learning in Europe 

–           Some sectorial associations, for the promotion of the project activities and the involvement of average but committed seniors, such as:

  • AUSER (http://www.auserumbria.it/) Association for the self-management of services and solidarity
  • ANTEAS (http://www.anteasfoligno.it/home/) National Association of Senior Citizens Active for Solidarity
  • ANCESCAO (http://www.ancescao.it/) National Association of Social Centers, Elders Committees and Gardens
  1. What is the background of CSF in open and free technologies?

CSF, having being involved in numerous EU projects, has collaborated with European partners in the development of open source technologies and OERs. The resources developed range from methodologies, and OERs to platform and software.

Although the organization itself cannot be considered as a pioneer nor a driver in the field of the FLOSS movement, CSF has always been committed in the use or development of open resources. Its staff has always paid attention to open and free technologies, attempting to make the widest use possible both for their daily work and for training the target groups involved in CSF courses. For instance, most of the courses offered by CSF on basic digital skills are implemented using software such as Open office and when dealing with video editing almost all the staff members are able to use Da Vinci Resolve.

What are CSF’s highlights in projects or initiatives in open culture or free software? How is CSF contributing to the open movement?

As mentioned above, CSF has implemented several projects and initiatives that, although not specifically focused on open culture, have developed diverse open and free tools and methodology. Here below we can mention some of them that have a link with adult education.

1)         “CAFE in Europe – Civic Awareness For Elders in Europe” was a LLP Grundtvig Multilateral project leaded by the Municipality of Foligno in collaboration with the Association of Civil Protection LARES, which involved other five European organizations. The main objective was to identify a common European training strategy in order to sensitize elderly people about their possible role of civil protection volunteers.

2)         VINTAGE (Valorisation of INnovative Technologies for AGing in Europe) is a LLP Grundtvig Multilateral project. (www.vintageproject.eu).  The project is an integrated action which aimed to face the digital exclusion of this target group by placing the elder in the center of the contemporary digital world. The impact of the project activities was ensured by the transversal involvement of different target groups, such as elderly people, voluntary associations, adult education institutions, public authorities, SMEs and other private bodies. We already implemented a well-structured dissemination plan both at local, national and international level, including numerous exploitation activities in order to put the bases for the sustainability of the project. In fact, starting from last March 2015, VINTAGE has been replicated at regional level with the financial supports of the Umbria Region within the framework of the “Regional Agenda for active ageing and social inclusion”.

3)         CINAGE project (Cinema for Active Ageing) another GRUNDTVIG multilateral (www.cinageproject.eu) started in 2013 and finished in 2015, focused on the active involvement of the seniors through an intergenerational training approach for the analysis of the European cinema production related to six areas of Active Ageing

4)         BRIGHTS a KA3 ERASMUS+ project that aims to promote Global Citizenship Education (GCE) in formal and non-formal Educational contexts with the help of Digital Storytelling (DS) techniques, leading to more socially inclusive education and training policies and practices in Europe. Its objectives are:

– Increase and improve teachers’ and trainers’ capacity to implement GCE with young people using DS;

– Empower young people in the acquisition and development of social, civic and intercultural competences as well as critical thinking, media literacy, creativity and digital skills through the production of digital stories on Global Citizenship.

– Develop of a European online community on GCE able to sustain project results and amplify their impact.

5)         DCDS a KA3 ERASMUS+ project aimed at developing an innovative multilingual Digital Competences Development System (DCDS) and use it to provide non-formal training to low-skilled adults in the non-formal education sector in different European countries. The System consists of:

  • A methodology for the development of digital competences and related transversal competences of adults
  • An online environment that implements the methodology

Moreover, from the beginning of the 2019 CSF has inaugurated a new digital hub open and free to all the citizens. The “DigiPass” is part of the Agenda Digitale per l’Umbria (Digital Agenda for Umbria), a strategic development plan for regional digitization. This center, equipped with training rooms, help desk and free internet access, is hosted in the premises of CSF and it has been widely used for training and promotional activities about CSF projects and initiatives.

  • What challenges has CSF encountered with integrating free software and open source in the training of low-skills adults?

The findings from the desk research for the OPEN-AE project underlined that there are different issues with integrating free software and open source on different levels but these issues are not related to specific target groups (i.e. low skilled adults) but rather to structural and cultural barriers training providers have to face. First of all, in Italy one can witness a lack of support to the FLOSS movement at policy and economic level. For instance, CSF, being funded by public entities, should be supported and orientated toward the use of free software and open source but in fact in the last years this support failed (see for example articles 68 and 69 of the “Digital Administration Code” that impose the preferential adoption of internally developed software solutions, and the choice of Free Software instead of proprietary solutions, on public administrations that never effectively took place). Secondly, many trainers are used to work with proprietary resources and tools because those are related to the competences the market requires and consequently when working they are naturally pushed to refer to those tools and resources. In addition to that, it exists a cultural barrier in Italy that speaks against the development and spread of free software and open source technologies and resources: the main cause being the allegedly shortage in quality of FLOSS alternatives in comparison with proprietary solutions.

  • What does CSF hope for the outcomes of the Open-AE project?

With the two years’ work on the Open-AE project, CSF is expecting first of all to gain extensive and deeper knowledge about free software and open source and the whole FLOSS movement. In this way, the whole organization could lead by example other organizations, starting with the ones involved in Open-AE such as adult training providers and then moving to public organizations such as The University of Perugia and the Municipality of Foligno, both funders of the CSF. In would be really great if in the public offices of CSF, the staff would be able to fully switch to open and free technologies (or at least partially). We reckon it would be a great message to send out the public audience the fact that a whole organization is using free and open tools and software (as far as we know it does not exist such an organization in our area, this would also mean presenting CSF as a pioneering organization at regional level). For the daily tasks performed daily by CSF (trainings, management, administration, etc.) there are several good solutions that could be used instead of proprietary software currently employed.

Secondly, the piloting activities will be a huge opportunity to involve other training providers and trainers, to have them approach the free and open technologies world and consequently to influence their own organizations in future decisions.

Finally, on crucial aspect that is indeed also one of the main objectives of the Open-AE: the upskill of trainers through a deeper understanding of free and open technologies and resources and the application of tools in their work. In this way, CSF trainers who attended the training in Barcelona and trainers, who will be attending the piloting course, will benefit from the Open-AE activities creating greater awareness for themselves and their own organizations.

Collectic and Open-AE project

1. Short introduction about Colectic

Colectic (formerly known as El Teb) is a non-profit cooperative that works for the inclusion, autonomy and empowerment of people and communities in the social, labour and technological fields. We understand and use technology as a tool for participation and social transformation. We work to promote universal access to ICT, by training and accompanying groups, social organizations and organizations from the Social and Solidarity Economy.

2. What is the background of Colectic in open and free technologies? 

We believe that the technology is a just a tool -a very good one- to promote autonomy and help people to be empowered; that’s why we work to promote universal access to ICT by providing training opportunities and accompanying social groups and organizations within the use of the technological services, tools and sources, and to be able to develop their own potencial.

We work into the social and solidarity economy (the opposite to the private and governed by capitalist logics one) and, as a consequence, we’re committed to encourage citizenships to be creative and not just “technology consumers”, to be capable of manage the sources they need to find answers to their own needs and motivations. We promote FLOSS, open software and hardware, because we believe that technology must be a common good, guaranteed and non exclusiva in the knowledge society.

In this sense, Colectic offers and favors learning spaces in groups, in the community, and in the exploration of this type of technologies (such as our digital laboratory RavalFab -where people learn to learn how to do digital manufacturing or our Omnia Room -a computers room that we dedicate to digital literacy). We not only do it in our territory, the Raval neighborhood of the city of Barcelona, but we also do an important job advising, training and providing technical assistance to telecentre networks (digital training centers), and especially to the profiles of the decision makers of the local and regional administrations and to digital facilitators and trainers.

3. Can you highlight any projects or initiatives your organisation has done in open culture or free software? How do you see your organisation contributing to the open movement? 

Besides offering learning spaces and consulting, advise and assessment, we have performed different migrations of computer’s operating system (from private networks of computers to open software network of computers), websites, productivity programs, etc. We have a long trajectory of accompaniment in the migration to free program to social entities too.

We also work on the advocacy level, as we promote the Floss culture by writting different articles in a web page dedicated to social entities and volunteers  (see http://xarxanet.org/etiquetes/general/sobirania-tecnologica)

Colectic also co-organize the TecnoFESC (a fair) an space where you can find the main entities, cooperatives and companies that work in the technological world from a point of view of solidarity economy.  Through TecnoFESC you can learn to promote open, free and neutral telecommunications, sustainable management and revaluation of computer equipment and public procurement responsible for electronic equipment to improve working conditions in producing countries. You will also find providers of technological services of the social and solidarity economy and drivers of technological procommunication, and will include the strategic use of telecommunications for the development of social justice. If you’re at Barcelona from 25 to 27 October 2019, you will be very welcome.

4. What challenges with integrating free software and open source in the training of low-skills adults came up in your research? 

Colectic’s focus group participants are people who are specially sensitized in relation to the use of open technologies and open resources, and they considered that they are part of a group of privileged people who, through individual and self-directed learning strategies, have accessed a set of relevant knowledge in this environment. They promote and use this type of resources intensively.

The participants are aware that, to this day, the Catalan telecentre network (formed by more than 400 centers, more than half of them based on the exclusive use of the free and open software) uses free software for training. However, they are skeptical about the adherence of their colleagues and, especially, of the people in charge (management staff of the centers and telecentre networks project management staff) of the training centers.

In their opinion, companies, citizens and administration are very reluctant to adopt this type of open software and open educational resources.

It is necessary to generate a good curriculum based on open technologies and resources and generate strategies to keep it updated on a permanent basis, to avoid that the curriculum becomes obsolete with the passage of time.

On the other hand, they consider it is necessary the curriculum to be complete (include resources for all areas of competences) and that it must be accompanied by a guide of recommendations for its adoption. Especially institutions and governments should find it easy to implement.

What do you hope to achieve with the Open-AE project? 

We hope we will find an easy path to help people, collectives and governments to use and promote FLOSS. Building an international community will help, for sure.

What is copyleft?

Licenses are often used to protect intellectual property. Software developers and authors may often protect their outputs by putting on a license. However, the burden on improving the outputs often lie on the creators and the holder of the copyright or license. Some creators choose to have open licenses when sharing their work, this is done with the intention Copyright holders of creative works can unilaterally choose these licenses for their own works to collaboratively share and improve those creative works.

License provide a lot of background to understanding the basis of free software. One of the reasons why people use free software is that people have the freedom to use software the way they want to, not the way the owners of the copyright may wish for the user to use it. Examples to illustrate this are formatting and compatibility issues when sending a document from a windows device to a Mac, or the availability of some programmes on some online app stores with some devices. A license or license is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something. Copyright is a legal right that grants the creator of an original work exclusive rights for its use and distribution while copyleft is a strategy of utilizing copyright law to pursue the policy goal of fostering and encouraging the equal and inalienable right to copy, share, modify and improve creative works of authorship.

Free software tries and make use of copyleft, the Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License and the General Public License (GPL). Users can utilize the 4 freedoms

  • Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program for any purpose.
  • Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works and change it to make it do what you wish.
  • Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute and make copies so you can help your neighbor.
  • Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

These freedoms and the licensing that grants these provide the foundation for software freedom, which is free not gratis.

Find out more information

Copyleft

https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/

GNU GPL

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.en.html

Licenses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License

Bridging the digital skills gap with FLOSS

The Open AE: Promote open source technologies in non-formal adult education project (OPEN-AE) aims to train e-facilitators, animators and trainer in digital competence centers and telecentre across Europe in using Free Libre Open Source Software

(FLOSS) technologies for inclusion.  The project partners have conducted a desk research and focus groups with trainers to develop a curriculum that matches training needs of trainers with available open education resources.

Partners and trainers in met in Barcelona hosted by OPEN-AE partner and ALL DIGITAL member COLECTIC. The focus groups conducted by partners with trainers in the field provided a lot of insight into challenges when incorporating FLOSS options to trainings. The trainers and partners taking part in the OPEN-AE project primarily work with digital excluded people who are trying to gain skills into order to gain access to services or the labour market. Learners in such position are aware of the software and skills they need to learn; however, they may often tie these skills with a propriety software option. The challenge of the e-facilitator is answering the need of the learners with equivalent FLOSS options, while ensuring that the needs of the learner are still recognized. Bridging this gap, proved on of the biggest challenges which the training tried to answer. Answering learner’s needs proved to be a challenge.

The training then focused on strategies, resources and best practices to address the learner’s needs. In order to guide this, a large portion of the training focused on the philosophy behind FLOSS and free culture. Supporting the “movement” is not exclusively with the use of Free and open software, there is the philosophy with ensuring content and creations can be freely shared.

Over the next weeks we will share themes

Open-AE Kick-Off Meeting in Brussels

A new Erasmus+ KA2 project on Strategic partnerships for Adult Education has started. ALL DIGITAL is the coordinator of the project OPEN-AE: Promote Open Source Technologies in non-formal Adult Education, which will be implemented with four other ALL DIGITAL member organisations. Open-AE was awarded through EPOS, the National Agency for Erasmus+ programme in Flanders.

The project will promote open source technologies in non-formal adult education to support the digital upskilling of both educators and learners. Its aim is to build capacity of non-formal training organizations, such as digital competence centers, to deliver high quality and relevant digital skills training to adults by improving staff competence on open source technologies.  The project objective is to improve teaching and digital skills of e-facilitators through a modular blended course on open source technologies.

Open-AE will promote access and learning through Open Educational Resources (OER). It includes the generation of open educational content on open source technologies, using open technologies for its production. It will promote open access to such content through a modular blended course (on-line and f2f seminars) and the generation of such content by the participants (e-facilitators) through work projects on open source technologies, as part of their training.

Digital Competence Framework for Educators (DigCompEdu) will be adopted to map the Open-AE course curriculum. Specifically, 10 e-facilitators will be trained in each project country on open source technologies through the Open-AE modular blended course. This will lead the creation of sustainable communities of practices around open source technologies, which will facilitate outreach to other educators, adult users and stakeholders across Europe.

The project was kicked off in Brussels on 12-13 December 2018 at the ALL DIGITAL office. As the project started already on 1 November, partners had previoulsy met at the ALL DIGITAL Summit in Brussels and held an online meeting to start activities.

The kick off meeting then focused on preparing the Open-AE curriculum. To do so, partners will research and prepare national reports for participating countries and one European report on the state of open source technologies in non-formal education. Partners will also hold focus groups with e-facilitators to understand their needs. Together the information from the national reports and focus groups will develop the backbone of the Open-AE training curriculum. The training curriculum will then be piloted in all participating countries on 10 e-facilitators. In total 40 efacilitators will be trained.

The pilot and Open-AE curriculum is expected to be a valuable resource for many ALL DIGITAL members. The Open-AE project was developed following the ALL DIGITAL 2017 members survey, wherein key challenges faced by e-facilitators working with adult learners in centres for non-formal education and digital competence centres were identified:

  1.  the need of innovative approaches to develop digital skills in light of rapidly changing technologies there need to be more user-focused modules on the development of skills;
  2.   the need to shift focus to the development of adaptable digital competences and not merely skills in light of these rapidly changing technologies;
  3.   the need to use standardised frameworks like DigComp and DigCompEdu.

From these three challenges, the priorities for the Open-AE curriculum were set :

  1.  promote access and learning through Open Educational Resources (OER);
  2.  promote Open Source (OS) technologies in the non-formal educational sector to support the upskilling of adult educators and learners;
  3.  address adult trainers working in the non-formal educational sector to reinforce digital skills and competences. To achieve this end, OPEN-AE will adopt the DigCompEdu in the develop of its training curriculum.

The partnership also involves:

  • Yinternet.org – a Swiss organisation dedicated to empowering citizenship and training on tools for socio-professional development and has a strong expertise in open technologies and collaborative skills training programmes addressed to adult learners;
  • Associazione Centro Studi di Foligno – an Italian training agency with a long-term experience in delivering of continuous and permanent training programmes to adult learners and in coordinating and participating in transnational projects focused on digital skills and digital innovation using open source technologies;
  • Maks vzw – a Brussels-based NGO recognized as a non-formal adult education center. Maks runs an IT learning centre where people can take low-cost courses or workshops tailored to their needs and a counselling service, helping people to get a job. Annually, Maks coaches about 500 adult jobseekers;
  • Colectic – a Spanish non-profit organisation working in fields related to community networks and technology. It promotes the use of open technologies to improve the situation of communities and citizens’ groups, with special attention to the weakest groups (NEETs, unemployed people, women, migrants etc.).