The Coalition for Open Education’s agenda has been set for 7 years nowduring the summer congress. Each year, we meet in different places in Poland to get to know new institutions and make an annual plan. This year’s summit was beaconed by strategic objectives. Institutions and organisations have planned their activities by the end of 2016 and worked out a program for years 2017/2018.
Since the coalition associates more than 35 organizations and institutions, it is important to create a space for discussion and workshops where we can work together on openness, inspire each other and exchange ideas. This time we met in Katowice in the Academy of Fine Arts (courtesy of the Academy authorities and cooperation with Medialab Katowice) from the 21 st to 23 rd of August.
Congress began with an open day, in which guests from outside the Coalition took part; we invited those we would like to see in our ranks. Participants had an opportunity to discuss the future of the Coalition working in groups – at the so-called thematic tables:
- Public Domain and orphan works, Klaudia Grabowska,
- Educational e-resources, Alek Tarkowski
- Business and open educational and cultural resources, Kamil Śliwowski
- Openness policy in institutions – science, culture and education Lidia Stępińska – Ustasiak, Michał Starczewski
- Regional Operational Programmes and POPC, Marlena Plebańska
This year, it was particularly important for us to activate all thematic groups- educational, cultural and scientific, so coalition partners identified challenges for each group as well chances of implementing openness policy at institutions of culture, science and education. What is the most significant, all groups worked out specific actions to be carried out in 2016 and plans for the coming years.
The Educational Group is committed to quality of open educational resources, which are created in Poland. The Open Culture Institutions have developed a strategy of openness policy implementation dedicated to decision makers in cultural institutions. They also discussed organisational details of Public Domain Day 2017. The Scientific Group was focused on the organisation of Open Access Week 2017 and developing an university ranking based on openness, what can be the basis for openness certification.
During the open day special guests appeared:
- Agnieszka Bilska i Marta Florkiewicz-Borkowska introduced Superbelfrzy informal group which changes the face of Polish education grassroots.
- Christian Barra presented BBC Microbit, the British code learning project, which he would like to transfer to Polish ground.
During the plenary session we announced elections to presidium, we refine the final shape of the coalition’s mission and recommendations. We also welcomed new members:
The congress ended with a visit in new Muzeum Śląskie and The Open Culture Institution’s workshop. The participants and non-KOED institutions extended their knowledge about the copyright and open licenses; they seek solutions of problems they face in their institutions during implementation of openness policy.
