Back On The Job Market

“Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.”

So I’ve had a major bit of news this past week. For nearly two years, my two main contracts have been to design and teach courses for LCO Ojibwe Community College, and to write articles and other content pieces for Education Dynamics. The latter has taken up the vast majority of my time since then, and provided a more or less full time income. Unfortunately, however, Education Dynamics has been wrestling with changing market realities lately, and my contract has been reduced pretty dramatically as a result.

On the one hand, I’m fortunate in the sense that I still have them as a client, even if it’s just a few hours worth of work per week. But what’s left isn’t enough work, so I find I’m back in the job market. The name of my web site hasn’t been accurate for a long time, but it seems for the time being it’s exactly right: hire me!

If you or anyone you know needs an educational technologist, higher education administrator, or writer, with experience in for-profit education, non-profit education, and startup environments, please let me know. My resume gives a pretty good idea of what I can do, but I’m also fast to pick up new things, so if there’s something you need done that’s even close, let’s talk about it!

Important: Unesco Replaces OER Acronym

Unesco logo
Today brings an important announcement from Unesco pertaining to open education. Those educational resources that have been referred to for the past nine years as “Open Educational Resources” are to be renamed. There are two reasons for the end of the use of the OER acronym. One is that there is continuing debate between those who believe these resources should be called “open” and those prefer to term “free” to describe them. Also, simply referring to them as “educational” resources has been shown to exclude many other areas where they have become increasingly important, such as research and training.

As a result, officially they are no more to be referred to as “Open Educational Resources”, or OERs. From 1st April on, they are to be known as “Freely/Openly Enabled Resources Supporting Training, Education, and Research”.

Unesco officials explained that while they realize that many people have become accustomed to the now deprecated “OER” terminology, it is important that these vital, renewable intellectual resources be renamed to something that highlights all of the areas where they are transforming education around the world. As such, it is expected that before long, those in the movement will become familiar with and happy to use the new term “FOERSTER” to describe these crucial resources.

Please make a note of it!