Hamburg Open Online University
https://www.hoou.uni-hamburg.de/was-ist-die-hoou.html
The project idea
The Hamburg Open Online University (HOOU) stands for the idea of a cross-university online learning programme with academic standards for people with an interest in academic education. Learning arrangements are made possible in which the learners themselves take centre stage alongside the actual content. Free learning resources (Open Educational Resources, OER) are consistently made available and embedded in meaningful didactic concepts for joint online learning and blended learning. An online platform is being developed specifically for the HOOU, which will be further expanded in line with the content and didactic requirements.
The project background
The project is based on an initiative launched at the beginning of 2014 by the First Mayor of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, Olaf Scholz, to digitalise university teaching with the participation of all state universities in Hamburg. The cross-university steering group "Digital Teaching and Learning" was set up under the leadership of the Ministry of Science and Research. Under this umbrella, the HOOU concept is being further developed and concretised in three cross-university expert groups (Open Educational Resources, Digital Qualification and Concept & Platform). The preliminary project for the HOOU started on 1 April 2015 with a total funding volume of 3.7 million euros and a two-year term.
A detailed overview of the development of the Hamburg Open Online University (HOOU) project can be found in the publication "HOOU Content Projects of the Pre-Project Phase 2015/16".
Second funding phase
The second funding phase of HOOU will begin in 2017. At the University of Hamburg, micro-projects for the creation of digital media as a supplement to existing courses are being funded in particular. From mid-2017 to September 2018, the University of Hamburg had the opportunity to apply for funding for the digital implementation of teaching content via the faculties to the teaching staff. No new project applications can be submitted at this time.
The HOOU brand essence
The basis for funding micro, meso and large-scale projects at the University of Hamburg as part of the HOOU is always the HOOU brand essence, which contains a set of four guiding principles that make up the overall Hamburg Open Online University project.
1. learner-orientation and collaboration
When developing learning scenarios and materials, the focus is on the learners - what are their goals and competences, their different biographies and individual learning paths? - especially when learning groups are made up of people from different institutions, disciplines or interested members of the public. In the learning architecture, learner-orientation is considered in such a way that intelligent suggestion mechanisms can also support self-determined, informal learning processes that are oriented towards specific problems and subject areas.
2. academicism
Learning in the context of the HOOU is orientated towards academic learning and promotes problem solving, joint reflection and design and thus scientific thinking and working. The learning materials are of an academic standard and originate from the scientific and artistic context or are in turn the result and product of individual or joint learning processes.
3. opening up to new target groups and relevance to civil society
The HOOU is not only aimed at the students of the participating universities, but would also like to explicitly invite new target groups who are interested in a joint discussion of academic content. A variety of perspectives are expected to provide a special value and higher quality for the processing and resolution of issues relevant to civil society.
4. openness/OER
The HOOU is orientated towards the idea of Open Education. It aims to make learning materials available as Open Educational Resources. In the long term, the HOOU aims to develop these educational materials in the form of Open Educational Resources (OER) as defined by Unesco (2015), which can then be further processed and shared. OER are available in varying degrees of structuring and coupling, i.e. for example as learning arrangements for participation, for reuse, as collections of materials or discussions about materials, as well as individual materials. In addition, HOOU pursues technological openness through the use of open source software, legal openness through the use of open licences, social openness as well as the opening up of spaces for action and learning in the didactically open design of the various learning scenarios. Openness is also expressed in access to materials and interactions in the sense of the greatest possible accessibility.