The University of Nottingham opens up its teaching to the world

PA 69/11 Opening up access to teaching resources is becoming ever more popular in UK higher education with the changing landscape of funding making transparency ever more important for universities, students and their families. By implementing the Open Nottingham programme, the University has embraced the opportunity to increase the use, re-use and publication of Open Educational Resources (OER) by staff and students, as well as all those interested in the teaching delivered at Nottingham. The launch of the Open Nottingham web-pages means that, for the first time, the numerous open learning initiatives available from the University and to its students will be available in one place. These initiatives include U-Now, a site containing a growing number of modules taught at the University, as well as Xerte — an independent OER website which provides learning materials from education providers across the globe. U-Now, which was first published in 2007, already contains over 150 learning resources, with all academics now encouraged to publish module handbooks showing the content and methods of delivery utilised in their teaching. In making this freely available to anyone who wishes to access it, the University hopes to increase learning opportunities for those who, for whatever reason, are unable to undertake formal qualifications, significantly contributing to the advancement of pedagogy across the academic community. To help to achieve this, project leaders have teamed up with OER Africa and the UK OER community to support developing nations in the expansion and improvement of their education provisions.