Thread:Consultation questions (2)

Before I respond to this request, I must apologise in advance for not having the time to read all existing documentation and for any comments I make that might not be accurate or relevant because of that.

In addition my views are based on the more immediate challenges we see in front of us.

1. We are of the opinion that "Transnational qualifications and course articulation" may be the most important goal. (Anything that makes it easier for us to accept credits from elsewhere or to have credits we award accepted elsewhere)

2. We believe that international "Identity Verification" is a serious issue and one that we need to deal with. We are concerned about controlling the cost of reliable remote examinations whether through the use of traditional written examinations in physical exam centres or using remote proctoring technologies (possibly including biometric identification). To some extent we are concerned about cheating during examinations but we are more worried about personation. We are not sure that this needs to be addressed by the OERu but we feel that if this is not addressed by someone it might undermine the credibility of major awards that are granted based on several years' work from several institutions.

I would appreciate others' opinions on this as I may be overestimating the importance of this issue or I may have missed some developments in the area.

3. I agree that we should be working towards a complete programme of study. However, I worry that "General Studies" may not be attractive to many particularly in developing countries. I would suggest that we need to be driven by demand rather than the courses we feel we can supply. Would it be possible to determine what areas are in demand in the developing world? (eg Health) We in IT Sligo are. For the moment, concentrating on developing courses towards an Associate degree (Higher Certificate)in Electronic Engineering (Embedded Systems). However, this is also supply driven insofar as we have academics here who wish to do this. It might be worth identifying a programme of study that would be of great value and ask members to find courses in their institutes that they can contribute towards this. We may have to set up, what we call in our institution, a "Programme Board" that defines firstly what is needed, and secondly, what courses are acceptable. I think we should be able to do both a "General Studies" programme and one targeted programme.