 Welcome to our conference and hello to everyone who is joining us. I'm Mareen Diegweil and as Altitude Executive is my pleasure and privilege to introduce to you our co-chair team. Now this is literally a world first. Never before have the OER and Domain's Conferences come together for one very special event that we're hoping to bring together this week with you and celebrate all things open education. Now because we're not meeting in person we can't have a hushed auditorium, the lights dimmed and we can't hear all of you watching and joining into this event as you put your hands together to give our co-chairs a warm welcome. So with a little trickery we have come up with a different way of welcoming our co-chairs on stage but I'd still like to invite you to put your hands together for what is a co-chair team like no one else before. We're here. We made it. Hello everybody. Good morning. Good morning from Scotland's. Yeah from Yorkshire in the north of England, big grey here. Good morning from Trento, Italy. And I guess good morning a very early morning from the east coast in Jacksonville, Florida. Good morning from Scotland too. So I think we wanted to start with quick introductions so I'll get that started. I'm Jim Groom. I work with Reclaim Hosting and it is a distinct pleasure to work with these co-chairs and the all team to bring you Domain's 21. OER by Domain's. I got a little branding problem there. OER by Domain's 21. So thank you all for coming. Likewise. So my name is Louise Drum. I work at Edinburgh Napier University and I am on the OER side of this co-chair panel and I'm delighted to welcome you all to OER Domain's 21 and it's a little bit of sadness for me that we're not welcome you to Scotland itself but there's a little bit of Scotland coming out to all of you right now. So you're all very, very welcome indeed. Hi everyone. My name is Lauren Hanks. I'm the director of operations at Reclaim Hosting and I am happy, so thankful and so excited for the next few days. So thank you all for joining us and really stoked to get started. Hi there. I'm Joe Wilson. At the moment I'm head of digital skills at City of Glasgow College but I've spent a career around vocational, educational technology and campaigning for more openness. So it's great to welcome you to OER 21. And I'm Lou Mycroft. I am a nomad. I build communities of people increasingly online and my playground is English Further Education so I'm absolutely delighted to see such a great presence here today and looking forward to learning loads and getting to know more people. And I'm wearing the same top which is a little bit embarrassing. Okay. I think Maren can we move to the next slide? There we go. Okay. So it's great to welcome you all and we've got 250 participants from 18 different countries and we've come a long way since OER 10 at the University of Cambridge. I've been privileged to get along to all of the different OER conferences so it's great to see this movement moving. And what I'd like you to do if you, so you're using all of the technology, find the Discord channel and give us a national flag or a symbol or something that reflects where you're from. Yeah. See it looks like Jim is having some issues with this. And again just that bit of just mentioning all our sponsors and welcoming our scholars too. So again in the spirit of openness it's great to be able to really offer free places to people in the spirit of openness. Yeah. I'd like to second that and say as somebody who benefited from taking a scholarship place in OER a few years ago that the scholars are a very important part of this conference and you're more than welcome here and we're delighted to have you. Oh wow look at this amazing map. This lifts my heart that we have a special welcome to further education and schools participants. We're all here as equal thinkers. We're all here as learners to learn. And I really appreciate how we have been able to push the message out into different parts of education. This is a space that has no siloed. Well it might do but we're here to push through the walls of them and all learn together. So I am particularly looking forward to welcoming people who maybe are here for the first time like me. This is my first day we are. I'm a bit nervous so if you are too then we're good company for each other. Next slide please thank you. So one of the cool elements of OER by Domain's 21 is this remixer machine where you can actually create on the fly your own conference lanyard badge. Brian Mathers helped us create this and it's magic. You can also use it to scroll and see all the amazing people who are joining us over the next few days. So please take the time. You'll see the link below. Make a badge and share it. Using here we go right. I think I'm ready. What are we going to use to share it? How are we going to share it? Hashtags. Hashtag like and subscribe for more. Yeah so I believe the hashtags. I'm not sure if that slide is there but the hashtags are OER X Domain's 21 or there's also Domain's 21 and I think also another one as well OER 21. So please use those as you are sharing on your social media platforms and that probably brings us to the next slide here which are it's kind of talking about the different ways that you can contribute to this conference and interact with this conference. There are quite a few platforms that we're using just to bring everything together but first and foremost if nothing else going to the conference display site is going to be your one stop shop so that is at OER X Domain's 21.org and this is just I'm so over the moon with how this has come together as sort of this TV guide of sessions and presentations and recordings and all of the above so you can click on a specific link it's going to open up an abstract and get you going right then and there so all of the chats are going to be embedded right on this page as well so when we're streaming to YouTube like we are now those chats are going to be embedded right in the YouTube sidebar on the conference display site and if there are presentations or sessions happening that are recorded for Domain's 21 those are going to have the discord channels that are embedded right there as well so next slide please. So these are going to just be your little screenshots from the help page that sort of describe in a bit more detail about how we're using YouTube live how we're using discord so please if you are interested in sort of engaging in a deeper level or a second level of the conference join our discord channel introduce yourself be a part of those other conversations happening in hallway chats yesterday karaoke went on for quite a while and it was a treat to enjoy the hashtag you know that's going to bring in all of the twitter conversations so there's a lot of buzz and conversations happening in discord that's just been really fun to watch already in the conference hasn't even is just now beginning so I would definitely recommend heading over there and then of course if you do need help throughout this conference we do realize that this is a virtual event which means things you know could break or you could lose a password or whatever that might be not an issue we have a whole help site it's on the conference display site and you can go to the menu and click help it's also by oerxdomains21.org slash help and that's just going to bring you through give you a greater overview of how this conference is running and also links out to helpful tutorials there's another discord invite link there as well once you're logged in and of course if you want to chat with someone directly beyond just reading this help page we of course have an email available as well that's listed on the help site and then of course the discord help desk channel which our staff is watching pretty regularly so the help is there please reach out if you have any questions and next slide please I was going to make my giraffe joke so this is actually the sponsors who actually helped us bring this conference to you so this is a slide to acknowledge them supporting us and hopefully in turn you can support them so thank you very much to all our sponsors I'll start this because I think we do have time I am looking forward to all of the time and energy people from across the globe as we learned put in to actually making this conference what it is and I mean the people who are presenting who are sharing it's been a tough year time has been a commodity so I just want to thank them all and I am really looking forward to it's a full schedule take the time and the beauty of it is anything you might miss will be immediately recorded and available for you after the conference so please take it and show some appreciation for all the work these people have done it's amazing so great I'll jump in next and say I'm just most looking forward to seeing the connections made across OER and domains and but also between people the conversations that are going to happen and happen and I think the beauty of discord is that you don't have to jump into everything but you can see this things going on there is a buzz and and to use that you know just that'll be the one thing just jump in where you can where you've got the headspace to do and do some listening do some deep listening and I'm looking forward to all the sharing that's going to go on and that might just be sharing problems it might be sharing it might be sharing good ideas it might be sharing visions visions of the future but that's what makes openness work sharing yeah I'm really looking forward to it being like a festival you know I miss festivals so much and you know when you sort of stumble for a sit down in a quiet tent and then something happens that blows your mind it's all the smoke that I don't even understand what the abstract is about that I am really looking forward to dropping into and taking my thinking off in a whole other direction and then what's really important for me is that it is a collective community experience so I want to be able to take that to discord take that to twitter and chat with people I've never met before I'm so excited about that what about you Lauren yeah I'm just super excited I think you know having the two teams you know the all team oh we are and then we've got this domains team and we've just sort of joined forces we're bringing all of our audiences together under one roof and so I'm just really excited for the opportunity to meet new folks also engage with folks that I've seen in previous conferences and then what's special about this conference for me using discord having something like the resources channel where you know maybe in an in-person conferences I'm not able to actually attend all sessions it's just not physically possible and so I miss out on a lot of that content for the sessions that I'm not a part of and so to see people sharing their resources and sessions that I haven't yet watched and then I can go back and it's just it's really nice to have all of that content right there and especially being in different different time zones knowing that I can go back and watch things that I haven't seen yet so super stoked just to have all of the content at my fingertips and really looking forward to the next two days we'd love to know what you're looking forward to so use the the comments and we are just about 30 seconds out from our opening introduction which I have to say I think was amazing we did an amazing job hi there I'm Joe Wilson I'm going to chair the the opening plenary of the of the conference so all very very exciting I'm looking forward to introducing to you introducing to you Tutolini who's an associate professor of educational technology and a director of emerging technology at the creative research lab in the College of Education and Human Sciences at Oklahoma State University Dr. Orna Farrell who's an assistant professor specializing in online and blended education in Dublin City University Nicholas Garcia much closer to home who's currently the student president at City of Glasgow College and Katherine Stiller OBE who's the CEO of Creative Commons and she's been an international champion for openness as a legislator and a practitioner for over over 20 years so I'd like you all to put your hands together and welcome our speakers please and I hear staggering in the background is that because of oh you're all there do you know I'm busy looking at two different screens so welcome to you all and for a couple of you getting to see me for the first time so welcome and really what I'm going to do is it's really just move through the questions that we were chatting about so and I'll actually start Tutolini I'll start with you and what I'm going to come to you and I'm going to come to you each in turn what has the past year been like for you in your role Tutolini? Wow first thank you so much for the opportunity to join the conversation it's great to be here and it's great to be on this panel the past year has is I'm struggling to find words to explain it it's been incredibly tough it's been emotionally draining all inducing and at the same time very inspirational it has been all of that because of the things that you know me as an individual have had to face and the things that the people in my communities have had to face my colleagues my students it's been a very challenging year but it has also been fantastic in terms of the humanness that I have encountered through other various communities and and Orna the same question to you what has the past year been like for you in your role? Again it's hard to find words for the last year it's been like 10 years in one but I suppose in a couple of phrases mental it's been a huge juggling act personally between homeschooling and children and working but also I suppose I changed roles midway through the pandemic as well so at the very start I was chair of an online program and also I was running a nice project called hashtag open teach and our program our online course started a week after we were sent home so open teach was around helping people learn how to teach online so it was meant to be a kind of a small open course you know we were expecting about 100 participants and because of the timing it ended up being a very big course of about 450 so that was that was the start of the pandemic for me working with with many colleagues who were really keen to upscale and cope with the change to online teaching or emergency remote teaching and then at the same time for my program even though it was a fully online program our assessments had still been largely campus based so there was a huge piece of work there working with my my colleagues in DCU around changing assessments you know in a short space of time but also trying to make assessments that were still flexible and student friendly and also dealing with a lot of student queries and problems and illness and and trying to reassure students that we would do our best to be there for them and help them so I mean that involved things like blanket extensions you know huge changes to the college rules were put through in short space of time and then after all that in in the middle of the summer I took on a new role leading a new learning design unit called the digital learning design unit which was created at DCU with the team of 10 originally to support academic staff teaching online and learning design and so I'm in that role still and that in itself has been a great new challenge I have a fantastic team and we've worked at a serious pace with a lot of lectures and I hope I think we've had a positive impact on on the institution so that's been my year so far as I said it feels like a decade I think I think some of us are like that and and Nicholas Nicholas what's the past year been like for you in your role when it is a student president yes so um I started my role in July 2020 and yeah it was just when the restriction from the first lockdown started to ease um it saw my background I was born in Uruguay and and yeah so I've been already on three major economic crises Uruguay 2002 the great recession Spanish recession in 2008 and this is the first time that I'm facing a crisis as an adult and with a full-time job so for me as a student president I'm the only full-time student representing 30 000 students in the middle of a pandemic so the pressure has been always been very very high um but yes um from for example I won the elections with a purely green manifesto environmental manifesto just before the pandemic and and I had in any crisis we need to try to read the context we live in and and and shift our focus if necessary so what I did this year one of the decisions I took was not only to focus on environment but also focus on mental health and on the digital transformation because we are going through a huge digital transformation in my college and and yet that's the reason I'm here today I'm very happy to be here thank you for the opportunity thank you Nicholas and and Catherine uh how's your role changed in the in in in the past year so I I I actually took on the role at creative commons in the last year so I've not met my team I've not met my board so it's been an interesting experience but also a wonderful one and just I'm just thinking about what Nicholas just said Joe because I just think how hard has it been for it being a student president in this year and I share that Nicholas because I was the president of my students association back a long while ago so I really feel for you and I think what presidents of students associations have done this year to try and help students has been quite incredible but if I also reflect on what Orna said about how it just feels it's you know it's like time has been really weird that you know our week seems to Friday's can't come along really quickly yet you feel it's a long time and I think that's something I've been kind of reflecting on plus having my kids who have now gone back to school in Scotland and so you know having homeschooling on top of that and trying to balance all all of those family and work has been an experience and one which I certainly have learned a lot about myself particularly around the words of patience and being able to multitask but it's been a great privilege to take on the role at Creative Commons and we've managed to get even with all our restrictions to get our new strategy through which is about better sharing and really focusing on our work on advocacy on innovation and on capacity building so it's been a real experience a real joy as well but a lot of learning Thanks Katherine for that. What I'm doing I'm going to go back round and I'm going to come back to Tutolini so in terms of open education what's helped give you some joy or shown care this year what are the things that have excited you? You know the the one thing that has really excited me is I think there's been a transformation from my interactions with with my it feels odd calling it colleague calling them colleagues but they're really more like friends in the open community. We through the past here there's almost been a transformation from the traditional sense and focus of open to what I can only I don't have the words for that I can almost just call it as open humanness. The people in this community for me have been also the one has been the most supportive they have been very open with their conversation open in the advocacy for students it's usually the people who for me in my community who are also interested in open who are advocating for just a gentleness with which we are treating each other with which we are treating students. You're more likely to hear someone who is from an open community pushing back at this idea that when students are online they have to have their cameras on or that we have to focus more on figuring out whether students are not cheating on their exams. There was there was a bit more of a supportiveness from from this community there was a sense of openness with the conversations that we're having people are sharing what's happening in their lives their struggles and so forth and we were sharing a lot of of solutions that are to the challenges that we are having in our lives and it was just really an openness of of of of engagement or someone say you know what no I'm not able to do this because I have this many things going on so although it has been a challenging year for me what has brought me joy is that it didn't feel as alone as as you would have and I perhaps I'm just biased because I'm a member of community I think it is also from this community that I have I've saw support and received it for the most part. That's a lovely statement and I've got all of these challenges too about academics demanding everybody to switch their cameras on and doing all of these kind of things and not thinking about learners. Orna how about you what is the oh what for you in open education has helped bring some joy to you? I think the I suppose one of the positives of the pandemic if there is any is that it kind of makes you reflect on what's important to you and what's important to me is people and community and I'm very lucky to be part of a number of different open communities and within my team as well and I've gained a lot of support and resources and help and I've endeavored to be the same to to put out the helping hand to to those who who ask for it. One of the nicest communities that I'm involved in was there was an event last year of Gastagos Global and that's a fantastic Irish ed tech community and global ed tech community as well. But I really believe in particularly Mahabali's ideas around the pedagogy of care and how we can show care in different ways and they can be small ways like how you design your course or you know requesting cameras off cameras on but she had a nice blog post quite recently about teachers caring for teachers as well because I think like this pandemic has been very hard for students but it's been very hard for teachers or academics or learning technologists as well and we have to protect our own well-being too and I think that that message is coming through quite strongly in the different groups I'm involved in. Also I think collaboration has brought me joy. I mean I love working with with with other people and I worked on some great projects this year despite the pandemic. OpenTeach is one example but another really local one working with a lovely group of colleagues from the library and from the open education unit in DCU and my own unit on a little project called GoOpen which is a beginner's guide to open education trying to try and encourage you know people in our own community in the DCU community to get involved and open so that's been a lovely project as well. So you know I for me the key thing has been community and collaboration and trying to try to put out a helping hand. Oh that's great and I suppose one of the things that I've always benefited from is the community the association of any technology. We're always my sounding board when I panic about things and Nicholas as a student president how is open education or what are the joyful things that you've seen this year Nicholas? Yes so I think that the thing that brought me the most of the joy has been so with the pandemic online spaces have become the only safest place where people can freely communicate and safely. So when back in September I created an environmental society open to all students and this environmental society has been the same that brought me the joy the most and not only to me but also to the rest of members and the reason for this is because this has been a space where students could meet and hang out, chat, communicate and build a relationship with other students which is very very important and indeed it's something that has come up in in our conversation with the students and in our surveys constantly. So students have the need to communicate to build relationships with mainly more importantly with their classmates to support each other to the cost of work and and and actually I cannot express and know how important is this peer support because in a face-to-face environment we have that need and in an online environment we still have that need it shows that it needs to be met online so so yes I think that those non-informal online spaces where to communicate freely have been the most the kind of thing that has brought me the most of the joy this year. Well that's good to hear nice I think that whole bit about informal learning in this in this world where we're all we're all zooming and we're all broadcasting to people allowing the allowing the people to actually chat to each other and interact informally is a bit I think we've all we've all been missing Nicholas so that that's a very good point and Catherine for you where's open education and what's shown you some joy this year? Well I think it's actually some of the stories about the successes where open education has stepped up in terms of the pandemic and I think you touched upon that about all the people that joined your program but I remember talking I think it was to Lorna about a program at Edinburgh where you know this this training event it allowed people to be trained to help those that were affected by Covid and it's those inspiring stories that I think all of you have about how you've made a difference and an extraordinary time of but also an extraordinary time where globally we've all been touched by it and I thought it was been interesting joining an international team at Creative Commons where you know we've all been touched by it we're all impacted by it we're working together in extraordinary times to still make a difference and I think that's that's that's something I'm certainly reflecting on I think the other aspect has been where we've been trying to do work and this has been led by the head of open education direct to open education at Creative Commons by Dr Cable Green on the UNESCO open education declaration and what we can do at that highest level to push government to ensure that this isn't the agenda and that's truly exciting as well but I do think this thing about thinking about care looking after each other and also perhaps and I don't have others have experienced this but when you're doing the virtual and on screens and all of this all the time there is something about how we've got to all intentionally listen to one another and actually truly listen and and that's quite empowering in terms of the change making we all want to see so there's just so many levels of that question Joe I could go into but I think that for me it's been working with my team having the impact and also trying to make that change in extraordinary I think to Delaney you mentioned that about your students about how you know it's an extraordinary moment that we're all going through but somehow we're going through this you know it's not that one bit is affected and we're all in this and we've got to to learn from that that that that that is super I suppose it I wouldn't be me if I didn't mention how much we're looking forward to working with creative commons and in driving forward the open agenda in Scotland through open scott and the other developments we've got we've got in train there it's just it's it's sometimes it's crises that bring bring super opportunities to remind people about how we should be working anyway really. Yes. To Delaney for you what's the biggest issue we need to tackle? To Delaney what's the biggest issue we need to tackle? I think it will help if I unmute myself but you always need to have that one person who forgets to unmute themselves on the panel. I think for me one of the biggest issues we need to to tackle is the issue of representation and equity. The more the challenge is that the more community becomes supportive the more it becomes necessary to guide against developing an echo chamber the more it becomes necessary to guide against being so comfortable with being familiar with those that are in the room that we forget to open the door for those who still need to get into the conversation or to open up a circle so that it gets bigger so we need I think we still need to be working more on being inclusive. For example I was I had the joy of addressing a conference at the University of Nigeria yesterday and I was talking about my concept of learning without borders and talking about issues of open pedagogy when someone asked the question and said well do you think it's possible to engage in open pedagogy in at our university and the question really what the person was asking about and he said well do you think open pedagogy is for us and for me that's sort of the the issues that signal to me that we need to do a better job of being more inclusive when someone can ask the question and say well no this is not for us this is from somebody else so we need to to be a little bit more open in in who's in participating in this conversation. I think open still is very much reliant on some sort of technology often too dependent on on the internet which means that we also need to start dealing with issues of the digital divide because not everybody can access certain things so while we while we are advocating for openness and for access we really also need to to think about who is not able to access this conversation these resources that we're advocating for. I often say that you know if you think about in terms of just textbooks as an example of open resources um often the same people who are writing a hundred dollar textbooks are now the same people that are writing the freely available educational resources so then we need to ask ourselves has that really changed anything has that really contributed to openness because who is writing and for whom are they writing who's telling the stories and for whom are they telling those stories so we need to also start thinking about when is it necessary for us to speak and when is it necessary for us to pass the mic and invite somebody else to be able to tell their story so I think for me really the the the issue is about needing to do a whole lot more about representation and and and and equity. Wow I think I think you're absolutely right that that that's that's really deep and meaningful and I think I think actually the how you open that your presentation about about a about having deeper understanding for people all all all links together get together so well. So Orna what do you think is the biggest issue we need to tackle? Well I was thinking about it on a kind of a broader societal level I think access I mean two Talani has mentioned some of the some of the things I was thinking about talking about so I'll try not to repeat his his points but I think access on a on a higher level so removing barriers financial barriers cost more flexible in Ireland cost is a huge factor for students with fees and also part-time students or those studying flexibly are discriminated against in terms of accessing state funding support so I think actually on a structural level we need to work on those structural access points and and also as the the issues of the digital divide which have really been highlighted by by the pandemic and I mean talking to students especially in March and April challenges around shared devices stable broadband Ireland is some very patchy broadband we had a student a couple of years ago who used to have to drive to a library car park to to use their broadband in order to go to an online tutorial and so so those issues haven't gone away and I think on an even a more global level I think the whole idea around access to information and paywalled journals publishing in journals that are then locked away I mean it's clearly not in the public good or in the interests of knowledge sharing so I think further further work around informing people of these barriers getting you know key stakeholders like libraries on board who are very much on board but also I think having especially worked on that recent project the go open one speaking to academics there isn't a very strong awareness of open education in in in some parts of the academic community in certainly in Ireland and and as two to Laney mentioned you know we need to broaden the community out further and we need to advocate more for open not that that isn't already happening but I think broadening the conversation broadening the group further is definitely important but I think without the fundamental access to higher education that people need in terms of costs equity all of that socioeconomic circumstances you know what's the point in having open knowledge if you can't actually get into university or can't afford to go we know absolutely absolutely that times as well and I think I think probably now is quite a good time for for Nicholas to give us the student sort of answer to that question what Nicholas is as a student president what are you seeing the big challenge uses being yeah so I I don't think that is about a specific issue I think it's more about us understanding the context and owning the responsibility to make sure that we establish all the learning that both COVID and lockdown has to bring us and this is on our our team level and our organization level and and well there are three there are two major trends that have been super accelerated with COVID-19 one is working from home working from home in us is not new but we have the responsibility to make sure that we understand what is working from us what is working when working from home and what is not and make sure that we learn about it and I think that we have learned that working from homes up has so many benefits for our work balance we can be more productive we can do more we save time but also I think some of the things that I learned is that we are not human doings we are human beings and that translated on a team day-to-day basis that means that well actually in the last year we have been from meeting to meeting from item in agenda to item in agenda and we haven't really connected with our team and maybe a year ago that wasn't excuse because everything changed but now a year has passed and we need to start creating those informal spaces for our teams to communicate and to connect in an interpersonal level and and actually some people might have some issues with these because they might think that this is a waste of time but actually this is investment because we are not human doings we are human beings and this is something that for example I have learned from working from home that haven't worked for me another trend is about how technology can enhance our productivity and we have learned that online learning is is not suited to the face-to-face learning is not and however technology can be used on so many ways and and this is the reason that for example in my college I see it as a college we started a process that really is a digital transformation from the first um blended learning guidelines to the creation of our digital steering groups that is looking at the new virtual learning environment we are transitioning to a new virtual learning environment um we have been running some digital we have been running service and focus groups to gather feedback for the digital strategy that has been redesigned for the VLE requirements and the scope requirements for the new VLE um yeah so I guess that we need to be alert and we need to the world has completely changed so we don't need to know everything we can find out together and and and the approach that we have taken at City Glasgow College is asking our primary user that is a student and another kind of case study as well that I can share with you is for example my college has created a digital transformation group for the future and this digital transformation group will make sure that we are um talented and and and discussing and gathering feedback about our digital experience to make sure that we strategically invest on technology to improve the online experience of our staff and students and I think that the last trend is about inequality inequality is not new but since the beginning of the lockdown we have seen how not only students but also staff they might not have the right wi-fi they might not have the right equipment the right software and for example to us students that is very it's a very hard situation because they feel behind just for being poor they cannot complete their tasks the coursework or maybe because they don't have the right wi-fi they need to go they need to go through very huge technical issues to complete the most simple task and I think that that's another thing that we learn technical issues have an emotional impact on people and and and and yeah so I guess that we some of the things that we that we learn is that we need to to work with colleges and and government to provide software equipment and and and internet to students who need it um yeah and and I think I guess the point I want to make in this in this question is we don't want to get back to normal we want to get back to a better normal so we need to make sure that we learn from the constant we live in and we implement and establish all this learning that both the Covid and lockdown have brought us that's super I'm hoping everybody I know I know it's particularly on the panel I'm hoping you're all busy looking at the lovely the lovely comments that you're all getting and the nice feedback you're all getting from from YouTube I mean it's a new experience for me too using this this technology today but but just you all all of your comments all of you what you've said so far is is is is getting such nice and endorsement from from everybody I'll come back to you Nicholas I know you've got something else you you want to see but but Catherine can what about you where do you think that the challenges are for the future so I I'm going to take something that Nicholas said because it is striking isn't it that in terms of the the the inequality that we see in terms of that we we talk about a digital divide I think it's actually a digital chasm and we saw yesterday in Scotland the the the next report about the data divide and so I think it's interesting that we've got you know the inequality of that is is just you know it's just been so highlighted I keep thinking about you know you know the model of Maslow's hierarchy of needs and I remember seeing one model of that where underneath it all now is Wi-Fi and I keep reflecting on that because it's it is become if you don't have access to to why if you don't have good access to the net then you are excluded and we have to think about how we can do that better so that's one thought the other thought isn't it interesting that we've got that but when it comes to equipment it would appear that you know governments are much more we get it when people don't have the laptop the chromebook the computer we need to make sure that people have access to that there's something about that there's almost a little disconnect and then the disconnect more so when it comes to open education sometimes that I think decision makers we still have a job of work and Joe I hope you'll agree with me on this one to to really convince why it's important and so I think over the next five ten years that we will probably win the argument about equipment and making sure people have access to that we can probably people see the reason about accessing why and how we can do something about that I think that the the real argument we have to make to decision makers is why open education actually addresses all of the things that we care about in terms of tackling inequality both locally and globally and I really feel that this is the moment that the pandemic can illustrate that but also that where we can take things forward show solutions and and evidence success with that so and and thanks I think or not or totally you're talking about bringing people on the journey but when we have to articulate our ladder of engagement with people much more strongly that we've got people in this call who are total advocates of of what open education means and does but we have to bring people some of people on a journey with us and I think that's maybe the next challenge that we've got to face thanks Joe and I'm now beginning to see some nice nice questions coming in so I'm just going to open this question up to all of you and it's a question from Dr Matt Smith really it's that bit of what are the things the pandemic should be a catalyst for some changes that should have been made a long time ago how do we need to ensure that the positives are kept so what are the what are the changes that should have been made a long time ago that we should now we should now be embracing well I'll go for that if you want Joe yeah I think one of the best well one of the best outcomes I think has been changes around assessment I think moving away from the traditional exam to more authentic diverse assessment types which probably would have taken decades to do and has been a really positive change and talking to academics using open resources open practices open pedagogy assignment blog post video like and really interesting diverse assessment types and previously they would have just thrown people into an exam hall for two hours so I think if that sticks that would be a huge win for students and student learning I've probably got a follow-up question about how do we make it stick I've still got lots of staff that are are bursting to get back to the old bad world and it's how to keep them on on that trajectory that is that is is is the challenge what about the rest of the panel what what are the other other things that you see have changed that should really have changed a week while ago I think our ability to use this kind of technology for having events and having that that we don't have to travel and I know that being together is important don't get me wrong about that but this is possible and Nicholas you've mentioned environment environment environment well if ever there's the most pressing problem we all face is the the climate crisis and therefore how we do this and clearly we've got to then think about how we power technology you know environmentally and all of those things but I do think that we can do things differently and we can work in this way I think that hybrid model of doing things you know in person but also being able to do things remotely are just and you know when we're thinking about climate footprint that's going to be more and more important that we evidence that we're taking that seriously that's good and I suppose another question I'm going to promote something here's a question here from Helen Beetham and and and Helen Beetham is saying you know that we're learning about synchronous learning gosh my question keeps jumping up and down this is me me and this technology there it is we're learning about synchronous learning and asynchronous allowing more space for thought reflection here for response alternative ideas which I think is wonderful and again I don't know how Nicholas feels but again working across a college it's been that balance of some lecturers want to zoom for three years and you think well that's not very good for them and it's certainly not very good for the for the students but what about your reflections on that between synchronous and asynchronous how's that helped staff and how's that helped learners sorry Joe is it a question for me it's a question for all of you Nicholas but I'm happy if you'd like to take it um I would love to but I will need that some clarification between synchronous and asynchronous so synchronous is what we're doing just now so you have to do that in a in a particular space in time and asynchronous allows you to go away and do domestic tasks and do other things and and come back and look at it at a time that suits you um yeah I can come in with them if you like yeah I think that we need to take the best from both um um in so for example in my college now we are we are doing the we're in the state where we are opening the competition between the next the different BLE providers and we have recruited 20 uh uh student volunteers to test the the potential new BLEs and we are doing it in a asynchronous way where students can complete the test at their own pace and I think that this is very important and more now in time of pandemic because we have we are working from home we have changed completely the the the way that we do things and each person has a different each person has different needs so there are people who concentrate better during the night time there are people who concentrate better during the weekends um for example if you are a creative student so creativity is something that you need to induce yourself and you're going to listen to yourself so I think that that's a very good question and and my position will be that we need to make sure that we get we use both of them in in the in for the right purpose and yeah okay what about everybody else I mean the is the tyranny of the timetable something that that that affect your institution um I can go come in for this one um I think asynchronous personally is superior uh for the reasons that Helen has mentioned it's much more flexible uh people can think about their answers it's better for students with uh disabilities um like for a huge number of reasons but what synchronous is good for is what we're doing right now community building so if you're using the approach for for that you know community building discussion group work fantastic but if you're doing what Tony Bates calls old wine and new bottles you're you know you're transferring the lecture from from being you know a passive sitting in a lecture hall to a passive sitting in a zoom room you know there's not huge value in that and I have to say this is one of the conversations I had most this year is trying to encourage people even just nudging them towards some asynchronous activity um so still a challenge I suspect and the pandemic is essentially being sponsored by zoom so I think that speaks itself for itself okay thank you but if I could just add onto that I think um for me one of the thing that resulted from those present circumstances is that it's harder to privilege one over the other I think they uh what what this time has shown us is that they all have their space uh there are some people who thrive in in in being in the moment and really feeding off of each other and there are some people who uh prefer that that um that reflection but there's some people who don't have a choice right so um for example many people had to be turned into um either into caregiver in uh unexpected situation or many of us had had to finally believe and understand that um for many people who are in the workplace are present in multiple contexts at the same exact time so now um you know we we normalize having um you know pets running across the the screen kids screaming in the background your partner coming in and say hey can I get this can I get that and all of these type of things happening um so for me I always thought the choice of either synchronous or asynchronous had a um a building sense of privilege to it because it assumes that you can do one or the other sometimes you have no choice and I think what the pandemic has shown us is that that fluidity is really um is really necessary for me when it started it was very difficult when when I was told that I have to teach the same class in person and online um you know and provide all this opportunity for students it's like well there's been times when I went to the classroom stood in front of a camera to broadcast to students because it was supposed to be a live synchronous class and no one showed up right the first second or third time I did that or it's kind of like well this is this is a bit hurtful because now I'm the one who's standing there uh alone it's kind of lonely but um but then I kind of realized that no this is that approach makes the learning process about me not the student who needs this flexibility need this synchronous and asynchronous option at the same exact time so I think the pandemic did force us to kind of really explore whether this duality that we have specifically promoted in online learning is really useful anymore that's that's absolutely super now we're we're actually into our last minute you know and again it's it's been a pleasure uh Orna I think I've met you at distance at other conferences and Catherine I know you and obviously Nicholas and Tutolini it's a pleasure to have met you on online and I hope I can welcome you to Glasgow and Orna and I can welcome you to Scotland at some at some point and we're now into that last minute is there any any final thoughts that any of you would like to give this this global community that we're you know that that are kind of invisible but appearing on our on our on our comment stream at the side in in YouTube so any any any brief last messages you would you would like to give to the OER uh open domains community I'm loving the set up though I'm watching the discord channel I'm watching the YouTube comments it's it's fantastic it's as close to a real conference you know in person conferences I've got to so I'm I'm really liking that yeah I think the set up is brilliant and I just think keep doing what you're doing and let's work together to meet the change we want to see I think I will probably um steal from Nicholas Nicholas you said something that really has stuck with me in the sessions that we need to remember that we are human beings not human doers and human beings means that you have to be present in in in a lot of spaces and it means that we have to recognize that people are present in those spaces and we have to be forgiving welcoming and open to a lot of those multi presence so thank you thank thank thank you all for your contribution to the opening plenary to the conference I hope I hope you're all all and I'm giving you a round of applause too I'm sure there'd be a round of applause going going the other bit in terms of in terms of formalities I think we're now into into break before the rest of the sessions I hope all of you get to hang about and I look forward to engaging with you in some of these other other social channels over the next couple of days and thank you so much and we'll close that we'll close the opening plenary session there so round of applause thank you thank you