Translating Strategy into Action: Previewing the 2018-19 Funding Calls

eCampusOntario is a member organization supporting Ontario post-secondary institutions, educators and learners to enhance and expand online and technology-enabled teaching and learning opportunities on behalf of the province. We seek scalable solutions which have impact for all our members. As a result, the concept of open innovation is a guiding principle for the release of new funding programs available to our members. Open innovation is “the use of purposive inflows and outflows of knowledge to accelerate internal innovation, and expand the markets for external use of innovation, respectively”^[1]. Systemic thinking requires us to take an ecological view of the Ontario post-secondary sector as we mount programs and services across 45 member institutions. We are focused on bringing systemic value to the Ontario PSE community through innovative and collaborative technology-enabled programs and services.

In a month, we will announce two new funding calls to our member institutions that are in line with the priorities and goals outlined in the 2018-21 eCampusOntario Strategic Plan. These funding calls will be in the areas of open educational resources development, and research and innovation initiatives with a scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) focus. Projects supported by this funding will be localized in institutions but will provide system wide benefit: all project outcomes must be shared through an open licence. For more information on open licenses, see Creative Commons.

The 2018 Open RFP is aligned with Strategy 1: to lead through open and collaborative practice. The funding program is designed to support the growth and development of OER in a number of targeted areas that centre on learners and the learning experiences. Theme areas for development include OER for flexible, online and blended learning in trades training and technology, OER for a full credential (Z-Cred), OER for experiential learning and workplace integration, OER for virtual reality and augmented reality, OER for curriculum materials and ancillary resources for use in courses with open textbooks, and OER for areas identified in gap analyses.

The 2018 SoTL Research RFP aligns with Strategy 3: inspire innovation through investment in research and development. The funding program is designed to further collective knowledge in emergent areas of practice and explore, test and evaluate new approaches to creating engaging and effective learning experiences. The funding call is framed by three Centres of Excellence identified in the Strategic Plan: Open Educational Practices, Experiential Learning, and Applied Research in Technology-Enabled Learning.

Further details will be released in the coming weeks. In the interim, we encourage you to review the eCampusOntario 2018-21 Strategic Plan to understand our commitment to enhance teaching and learning practices through open innovation. We look forward to the release of the 2018 funding calls to support the expansion and evolution of online and technology-enabled teaching and learning across the province.

^{1 Chesbrough, H. (2006) Open innovation: researching a new paradigm. Oxford University Press.}

^{Orr, D., M. Rimini and D. Van Damme (2015). Open Educational Resources: A Catalyst for Innovation, Educational Research and Innovation, OECD Publishing, Paris. http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264247543-en}

^{2 Ramirez, M.S. and F-J Garcia-Penalvo (2018). Co-creation and open innovation: systemic literature review. Communicar – Media Education Research Journal n54, v26, pp09-18. 2018. https://doi.org/10.3916/C54-2018-01}