December, 19, 2010
Research Questions:
How will OER influence the inclusion of local voices in the educational curriculum of developing countries?
How will the growth of online education affect access to education in developing countries, in particular South America?
How will the growing ability for individuals to generate their own videos and other electronic forms of media and the increasing availability of high quality OERs affect traditional higher education?
What are the ways in which mobile technology will impact education (K-12, Higher, Vocational, Formal, and Informal)?
Will the growing use of the internet and the growing access to mobile technology impact the way in which remittances are sent to third world countries? Will the links from migrants with their country of origin continue to strengthen?
Will the increasing use of technology transform the transfer of knowledge, the brain drain, and led to the rise of technological transfer and knowledge remittances?
Sources:
(These are books in my short reading list. Since the questions interrelate, these books will be equally relevant to all of these research questions). Hopefully, my research will take place in the Dominican Republic. For this reason I included additional sources). All of the following sources are books.
– The Tower and The Cloud – Katz
– Invisible Learning – Cobo and Moravec
– Classroom of One – Maeroff
– Evaluation and Implementation of Distance Learning; Technologies, Tools and Techniques – Belanguer and Jordan
– Open and Distance Learning in the Developing World – Perralton
– Reconsidering Open and Distance Learning in the Developing World – Kember
– From Digital Divide to Digital Opportunity – Kuttan and Peters
– Bridging the Digital Divide – Servon
– Innovation in Open Distance Learning – Lockwood and Gooley
– Virtual Inequality: Beyond the Digital Divide – Mossberger, Tolbert and Stansbury
– Technology and Social Inclusion – Warchauer
– Digital Divide – Norris
– The Digital Divide – Compaine
– Educacion Dominicana y Construccion del Conocimiento – Alvarez, Billini, Billini, Mella, Zaiter
– Un Camino Hacia el Desarrollo – Hector Valdez Albizu
– Desarrollo Economico Local – D’Aza
Tentative Timeline
– Preliminary readings – Christmas and Spring 2011 semester
– Apply for funds through the Global Spotlight – Emphasize the impact of urbanization in the spread of technology and my interest of researching in Latin America
– Visit Argentina with Dr. Furco – EdPA 4801 – and find connections and linkages with my interest. This includes visiting their ministry of education as well CDI and other NGOs which are empowering children through technology and service learning.
– Continue my course work – Link my studies with the Learning Technologies Media Lab
- Build relationships with the Innovation Studies Program
– Work on a preliminary paper and research project that involves part of the question to be evaluated. I am currently interested on the impact of OER in the Dominican Republic. I am hoping to work with INDOTEL in the near future. Having family in the Dominican Republic will facilitate the study. I am interested in the CTC initiative as well as their video game design and OER initiative at ITLA. Since all of the organizations are run through the government, being able to contact the ministry of education direction will hopefully facilitate further exploring any of these tentative questions.
– The time that will be needed to graduate will depend greatly on my wife situation. At the moment I am hoping to finish most of my requirements (all but dissertation) in two and a half years.
