TOPIC STREAM 07: Open Research and Education

Openness is very much in action in the generation and dispersal of knowledge. The Open Research and Education stream will offer talks, debates and hands-on workshops geared particularly towards educational specialists, researchers and scientists.

The Open Research and Education stream is made up of three related strands; (1) Open Science and Research; (2) Open Education and (3) Open Data Academic Research. See below for the timetables for each!


Open Science and Research

  • Don’t miss the Culture and Science Hackday! (sign-up here ) or the Open Science themed dinner (sign-up here)

  • Open Source Drug Discovery - a keynote address by Mat Todd from the University of Sydney

  • Open Science at the European Commission - an interactive discussion about the European Commission’s new open access policy, led by Carl-Christian Buhr
  • Open Access in Practice - How? - featuring representatives from the Sanger Institute, the World Bank and the Open Access Index.
  • Communicating Science Openly - a panel discussion with representatives from Wikimedia, academia and beyond.
  • Immediate Access to Raw Data from Experiments - with Mark Hahnel (Figshare), Mark Wainwright (CKAN) and Joss Winn (Orbital project, University of Lincoln)
  • … plus book sprints, peer review sessions, a hackday, a social and much more! See the timetable below for more details.
Date Time Where What Details
Tue 18 Sep 11:30-19:30 HACK Workshop 1 Open Science Hackday HANDS ON: Get stuck into opening up science and scholarly communication as we bring thinkers, hackers and scientists together to produce tools and apps for open access, citizen cyberscience, research data management and more. Further details and sign up here
Wed 19 Sep 11:30-12:00 Aalto Pro Introductions Introduction:Join Laura Newman and Jenny Molloy as they introduce the Open Research and Education stream at OKFest. An opportunity to deliver lightning talks and to catch-up on the outputs of Tuesday’s hack.
>> VIDEO
Wed 19 Sep 12:00-13:00 Aalto Pro Communicating Science Openly PANEL SESSION:What is the best way to communicate science in the current digital world? From communication between scientists to public engagement, our panel will discuss how technology and culture enables or disables effective open sharing of scientific knowledge and discussion or debate. Featuring Daniel Mietchen (Wikimedia), Cinzia Colazzo (Pedagogical Advisor at Deutsch-Russisches Jahr der Bildung, Wissenschaft und Innovation) and Johanna Lilja (Federation of Finnish Learned Societies), Paul Ylioja (University of Sydney). Chaired by Jenny Molloy.
>> VIDEO
Wed 19 Sep 14:00-15:30 Aalto Pro Open Access in Practice - How? PANEL SESSION: Explore how Open Access can work in practice, from business models to the technicalities of standards and licensing. Hear from a range of initiatives around the world and share your experiences with the audience. Featuring Tim Hubbard (Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute), Carlos Rossel (World Bank), Tom Olijhoek & Mark MacGillivray (Open Access Index) and Ross Mounce (OKFN Panton Fellow). Chaired by Peter Murray-Rust.
>> VIDEO
Wed 19 Sep 16:00-16:45 Aalto Pro Immediate Access to Raw Data from Experiments PANEL SESSION: Open research data is now being pushed by research funders and learned societies alike, but when and how should it be released? Mark Hahnel (FigShare), Mark Wainwight (CKAN), and Joss Winn (Orbital project, University of Lincoln) discuss the practicalities of data sharing platforms and aggregators, open source algorithms and tools, and the challenges and benefits of releasing raw data now.
>> VIDEO (start time 0:35)
Wed 19 Sep 16:45-17:30 Aalto Pro The OKFN Panton Fellowships: from data mining to graduate training SEMINAR:The OKFN Panton Fellows for Open Data in Science, Ross Mounce (University of Bath) and Sophie Kershaw (University of Oxford) introduce the Panton Fellowships scheme and the individual projects they have been working on. Come and find out how mining open data could help phylogeneticists decipher the tree of life and how to inspire a new generation of open scientists through pre-doctoral training.
>> VIDEO / PART 1 (Ross Mounce)>> VIDEO / PART 2 (Sophie Kershaw)
Wed 19 Sep 18:00-19:30 INSPIRE Auditorium Open Source Drug Discovery KEYNOTE:Mat Todd (University of Sydney) describes the principles of open science in action delivering solutions for safe and effective treatment of neglected tropical diseases. Mat headed up a project to improve synthesis of the major drug againt the tropical parsite schistomaniasis involving extensive collaboration between academia and industry and is a leader in the Synaptic Leap community for open source biomedical research.
>> VIDEO (start time 4:35)
Wed 19 Sep 20:00-late Location tbc Open Science themed dinner SOCIAL:Following on from Mat Todd’s key note speech, anyone with an interest in open science and open access is warmly invited to an Open Science themed dinner. This will be a relaxed and informal opportunity for everyone from the stream to meet one another and to share their ideas over dinner and a drink. All are welcome, but please do sign-up in advance
Thu 20 Sep 11:30-13:00 INSPIRE Meeting Room The Challenges of Crowdsourcing Data CROSS-STREAM PANEL SESSION: This session will be an interdisciplinary cross-stream event, co-organised by the Open Resarch and Education and the Open Development streams. During the session, a panel of speakers will present their experience of collecting and working with crowd-sourced data. Coming from a variety of backgrounds, disciplines and perspectives, they will discuss tools, projects, successes - and the ongoing challenges of collecting, analysing and sharing both development-related and scientific data via citizen science projects. There will be an open and relaxed panel format, with plenty of space for questions and discussion. The panel will include Philip Thigo (Huduma), Anahi Ayala Iacucci (Internews), Linda Raftree (Plan USA), Victor Miclovich (RapidSMS consultant, lead developer, Kirril), Daniel Lombrana Gonzalez (Citizen Cyberscience Centre) and Stephen Davenport (Development Gateway). The session will be moderated by Paul van Haver (TechSoup Global).
>> VIDEO
Thu 20 Sep 11:30-16:00 HACK Workshop 2 Open Research Data Handbook Writing Sprint HANDS ON! At a hackday earlier this year, an outline was drawn up for producing an Open Research Data Handbook along the lines of the wonderful Data Journalism Handbook. We have a (flexible) table of contents and an account on collaborative book site Booki so join us for a writing sprint to add your expertise and ideas or even lend a hand with some editing, as well as great chat and discussion throughout of course!
Thu 20 Sep 11:30-16:00 HACK Workshop 2 Open science tools on trial HANDS ON! Come experiment with different open science tools for handling your publications, data, social networks, workflows and more. Your feedback will be used to bring together a directory of open science tools which will also form an appendix to the Open Research Data Handbook. If you’ve got a tool you want feedback on or you’ve used a great one you could recommend we encourage you to drop in!
Thu 20 Sep 16:00-17:30 8th Floor Auditorium Open Science at the European Commission SEMINAR: The European Commission is highly supportive of both open access and open science. Carl-Christian Buhr (Member of the Cabinet of Ms Neelie Kroes, European Commission Vice-President for the Digital Agenda) will present the Commission’s new open access policy and infrastructure initiatives then lead an interactive discussion about opportunities for bringing together the European open data and open access communities. Not to be missed!
>> VIDEO (start time 2:30)

Open Education

The Open Education Sessions feature a range of events over Wednesday and Thursday, ranging from a workshop on the School of Data and the School of Open to Pecha Kucha sessions, Fishbowl conversations, roleplays, a drafting sprint and more! See the timetable below.

Thu 20 Sep11:30-13:00HACK Workshop 4The Peeragogy handbook: an open learning work-in-progressWorkshopThe Peeragogy project is a voluntary project of people who are coming together to write a handbook on peer-to-peer learning. The handbook is intended to be a growing how-to resource for various aspects of Peeragogy. Current articles include, for example, meta-learning and cognition, personal learning networks, personal learning plans and how to organize a massive open online course. For the workshop, we plan to break into several smaller workgroups. Some examples of the type of content that could be worked on are e.g. visualization (communicating aspects and articles of the handbook with videos, infographics, etc.) and activities (we would like to enhance the handbook with hands-on descriptions of activities that could be done in-person or with computer/internet tools, that help people grasp and use the ideas in each chapter). Only a few examples of possible workgroups are mentioned above.

Date Time Where What Details
Wed 19 Sep 11:30-15:30 HACK Workshop 4 Open Peer Learning: School of Data and School of Open Led by Creative Commons, P2PU & OKFN Outside of the open communities, few people know how to apply “open” tools, practices, and standards to their work. Many struggle to ‘wrangle’ data, whether for work or pleasure. Creative Commons, P2PU, and the OKFN will introduce the School of Open and the School of Data, followed by a Q&A and a hands-on, creative workshop to prototype “open” challenges and courses. Participants will have the opportunity to take the “Teach someone something with open content” challenge in an offline, small group setting, and translate that learning into designing an effective challenge in their “open” area of interest. Challenges may be anything from “Copyright for educators” to “How to get your journal to be Open Access” to “Using (open) data to prove your point”. There will also be a chance to play-test School of Data materials and even build your own. Sign up here
Thu 20 Sep 11:30-13:00 HACK Workshop 4 Peeragogy The Peeragogy projectis a voluntary project of people who are coming together to write a peer-learning handbook. The handbook is intended to be a growing how-to resource for various aspects of Peeragogy. The Peeragogy workshop will be hands-on, giving participants the opportunity to experience a peeragogical learning and working experience. Participants will:
  • LEARN about the idea behind Peeragogy.
  • MAKE a visualization, such as communicating aspects of the handbook with videos, infographics, etc., or a learning activity, such as hands-on descriptions of activities that could support people to practice the ideas in each chapter, or something you suggest.
  • PRESENT AND DOCUMENT our learning experiences and outcomes, as well as suggestions on how to improve the Peergagoy handbook.
The workshop will be facilitated by 3 Peeragogy team members (2 remotely). Welcome!
Thu 20 Sep 11:30-13:00 Aalto Pro Pecha Kucha: Open Education Pecha Kucha 20 images, 20 seconds each. That’s a pecha kucha talk that takes exactly 6 minutes and 40 seconds. We have a series of them lined up to give you a fast-paced 90 minutes with topics ranging from aesthetic responsibility in social media to forestry mapping, urban identities, open tools, open projects, and more. Stay after the talks to talk to the presenters in depth! See the planning pad for up-to-date list of topics.
>> VIDEO
Thu 20 Sep 14:00-15:30 Aalto Pro Fishbowl conversation: Open Education Fishbowl Conversation Fishbowl conversations allow everyone to listen, comment, talk, and debate as much as they want. We have three topics for discussion: 1) how to properly design MOOCs, 2) Peeragogy open learning handbook, and 3) the future of textbooks. Speakers: EVERYONE! See the planning pad for up-to-date list of topics.
>> VIDEO

Open Data Academic Research

The Open Data research session will focus on the impact of Open Data research within the academic environment. The session will bring together the latest research concerning Open Data and Open Government Data, forming a interdisciplinary mix of short presentations followed by a discussion panel.

http://blog.okfn.org/2012/06/29/call-for-papers-open-data-academic-research-at-okfest/

This session will take place on Thursday 20th September, 16:00-17:30 @ Aalto Pro

>> VIDEO


Participant Testimonials

“It’s very exciting to be in the world of Open Knowledge.” Sridhar Gutam, OKfestival Guest Programme Planner, Senior Scientist, Central Institute for Subtropical Horticulture (Indian Council of Agricultural Research) and Convener, Open Access India.

“The Finnish historical tradition of informal education is an interesting parallel to how the new technologies and networks are changing education around the world. Hopefully we’ll learn from this past and can constructively embrace the future.” Tarmo Toikkanen, OKfestival Guest Programme Planner, researcher, Learning Environments research group, Media Lab Helsinki, Aalto university, Finland.

“OKFest is a great opportunity to showcase the value of openess in science,  where open knowledge is in action generating even more knowledge as well as developing real world applications.” Jenny Molloy (Open Science Working Group Coordinator, OKFN and University of Oxford, UK)

“OKFest  is an ideal platform for sharing ideas on the making of an open science  society where open access to all accumulated knowledge is the driving force for innovation and development” Tom Olijhoek (@ccess initiative coordinator, OKFN)


Guest Programme Planners

  • Tarmo Toikkanen (researcher, Aalto university School of Art, Design and Architecture) - Finland
  • Sridhar Gutam (Senior Scientist, Central Institute for Subtropical Horticulture (Indian Council of Agricultural Research) and Convener, Open Access India)
  • Jenny Molloy (Open Science Working Group Coordinator, OKFN and University of Oxford, UK)
  • Laura Newman (Community Coordinator, Open Knowledge Foundation, UK)
  • Jane Park (Communications/Project Manager, Creative Commons, US)
  • Tom Olijhoek (scientific consultant,Dutch Malaria Foundation, SURF-NL , coordinator @ccess initiative, Netherlands)
  • Ramine Tinati (Researcher, Web Science, Southampton University, UK)