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In this economy, people around the world are asking fretfully what it takes to stay relevant in the current globalized job market. Is it skills? Is it knowledge or just a load of degrees? Honestly, there is not a single universal answer. There is, though, one thing we could write down and take into daily account: never stop self-improving.
Now, more than ever, it’ s easier to learn new things, harness and hone our talents and skills, and employ new tools and techniques. By adopting the innate values of openness, accessibility and transparency of the Internet, leading foreign universities and colleges have started sharing their accumulated knowledge through an expanding list of online venues. Lectures, seminars, class notes, assignments and up-to-date research papers in every scientific field can be easily accessed by visiting either popular social networking hangouts or explicit files hosting websites [Scribd, Esnips].
Still the number one destination in the aforementioned list is iTunesU, the free academic counterpart of the succesful iTunes store. By congregating academic content from a growing directory of participating scholarly institutions , iTunesU has turned into a gigantic online campus filled with videos and podcasts from lectures, seminars and supplementary academic material on almost every science and art known to man.
In the meantime the OpenCourseWare Consortium has gathered a noteworthy roster of universities as members and contributors to its goal: «to provide high quality education materials, organized as courses». Almost every country is represented in the Consortium, but don’ t expect to see any Greek university in this catalog. Greek higher learning institutions are still struggling to grasp the merits of the distance-learning programs ; we have a long road ahead of us, until educational administrative policies start fostering the attributes of online shared knowledge [even if there are high hopes with the new administration].
On the same foundation of this trend, seven prestigious American universities have assisted in the creation of AcademicEarth. Yale, Princeton, Harvard, Berkeley, UCLA, MIT and Stanford are now sharing videos straight from the classroom on issues involving law, literature, mathematics, political science, history, entrepreneurship and many more. It’s actually surprising that this breadth and depth of knowledge is just a few clicks away. In the same spirit, FORA.tv provides one of the largest video libraries of live events, seminars, conferences, discussions , etc. The list of content providers includes think tanks, universities, foundations, councils, research centers and exclusive policy clubs.
Some people might think that there has to be an ulterior motive behind this openness. Maybe it’s another publicity stunt to attract more students or a governmental activity in the context of a country’s public diplomacy. But could there be a slight chance that there is nothing suspicious in these initiatives? Are we walking into an era when knowledge is free and easily accessible? Could this actually help social cohesion and equality policies? One can only hope.
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Tags: Distance education, Distance Learning, education, Higher education, ITunes Store, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT OpenCourseWare, OpenCourseWare Consortium
