OAER and Open Communities of Practice

Alison Bonner, Elizabeth Nelson, and Larry Musolino from Penn State presented a 23-min recorded session at Open Ed 2021 entitled “Let’s Make Something For OUR Students: Value of Discipline-Specific Communities of Practice in OAER.” Bonner first described discipline-specific communities of practice and the advantages of communities for OER work. They defined communities of practice as “groups of people who share a concern or passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly” using previous studies. For disciplinary work, they spoke about partners. They talked about the Math OAER for Open and Affordable Educational Resources. The Math OAER COP at Penn State Lehigh Valley was established in 2020 and has an informal and open structure, has member-led project decisions, and includes a variety of experience levels. The group encompasses a variety of levels of OER awareness. Their goal was to include scaffolding and write a workbook that would help alongside OpenStax OER. The project has been awarded a PA Open award. They spoke about the benefits of organizing around practice and emphasizing community to discuss engaging all members and supporting students. While the content is different, this aligns with some of the projects we have about microbiomes and bioinformatics resources for educators. Their advice was to identify allies, encourage membership, be open to all voices, and consider your project needs.

feet and arms from numerous people coming together on grass
What does it take to form and sustain a discipline-specific community of practice? Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com