Abstract
<p>Several scholars and organizations suggest that institutional policy is a key enabling factor for academics to contribute their teaching materials as open educational resources (OER). But given the diversity of institutions comprising the higher education sector—and the administrative and financial challenges facing many institutions in the Global South—it is not always clear which type of policy would work best in a given context. Some policies might act simply as a “hygienic” factor (a necessary but not sufficient variable in promoting OER activity) while others might act as a “motivating” factor (incentivizing OER activity either among individual academics or the institution as a whole).</p><p class="1">In this paper, we argue that the key determination in whether a policy acts as a hygienic or motivating factor depends on the type of institutional culture into which it is embedded. This means that the success of a proposed OER-related policy intervention is mediated by an institution’s existing policy <em>structure</em>, its prevailing social <em>culture </em>and academics’ own <em>agency</em> (the three components of what we’re calling “institutional culture”). Thus, understanding how structure, culture, and agency interact at an institution offers insights into how OER policy development could proceed there, if at all. Based on our research at three South African universities, each with their distinct institutional cultures, we explore which type of interventions might actually work best for motivating OER activity in these differing institutional contexts.</p>
Highlights
Several scholars suggest that institutional policy is a key enabling factor for academics to contribute their teaching materials as open educational resources (OER) (Browne et al, 2010; Carson, 2009; Corrall & Pinfield, 2014; Janssen et al, 2014; Lee et al, 2008; Lesko, 2013; Reed, 2012)
We explore the potential of OER-related policy interventions at three South African universities, each of which have quite different institutional cultures
This caveat does not obviate the need for some form of appropriate policy to exist for OER activity to proceed at an institution, but it suggests that a number of other factors may have a greater impact on motivating academics to use or contribute OER than policy
Summary
Several scholars suggest that institutional policy is a key enabling factor for academics to contribute their teaching materials as open educational resources (OER) (Browne et al, 2010; Carson, 2009; Corrall & Pinfield, 2014; Janssen et al, 2014; Lee et al, 2008; Lesko, 2013; Reed, 2012). Should OER contribution by academics at a university be “mandated” or “encouraged?” Bliss (2014) argues for mandate-style policies that would require academics to “adopt”—use and create—OER as default practice. The potential of this approach can be seen at institutions that enjoy high levels of administrative and financial capacity to support such policy commitments—such as MIT (Abelson, 2008; Carson, 2009), which has opened up almost all of its course materials through its OpenCourseWare initiative (http://ocw.mit.edu)—and other types of institutions that have adopted an Open Access mandate (e.g., European Commission, CERN, World Bank, etc.). Would an OER mandate be appropriate at institutions where administrative and financial capacity is weak, as is often the case in the Global South?
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