Journals of Leadership - Open Access

On this blog, you find an overview of academic journals covering leadership and distance education. All the journals have been chosen because they have open access. From my point of view, open access is crucial in a globalized networking world. I have argued for this since 1998, where I developed my first HTML-web-site for a project.

Later on, when I developed several web-sites for educational programs (some of them fully-on-line - and some of them blended) and for R&D projects with colleges and universities, I argued in the same way. At that time, I was so priviliged to have a superior who listened to me. I was, therefore,  allowed to suspend all passwords, subscriptions and protections. So, passwords were only used to protect the participants' contributions in the virtuel forums where debates, dialogues and collaboration took place. Such a protection is important in a learning environment from ethical reasons. However, there are no reasons to hide study-guides, learning materials, bibliographies, cases, plans ( for lessons and semesters), evaluation criteria and reviews. My sceptical peers argued that any educational institution in Denmark - and in the world - could copy and steal our materials. They were of course right: anyone could and someone did.Especially, an English version of an educational program for DE consisting of 8 modules was re-used in university settings. However, I still argued that our main contribution was how we interacted with our students and participants - if someone could find inspiration in our bibliographies and study-guides it could not harm any of our activities. On the contrary, it should be seen as a positive feedback on our work.

Finally, open access added new dimensions to our educational and organizational development because the leaders of the colleges could follow and look into the training of their teachers. Therefore, open access enhanced collaboration in developing new competencies and activities. In this way, educational partnerships were strengthened through open access.

It is still my belief that access to knowledge and information is essential in higher education and research. Someone could argue - like my former peers did-  "that education is business". They are right, but it is a short term perspective. Open access is a must because Europe has to compete internationally. It provides a vital approach that enhance knowledge creation, quality, innovation and sharing. Additionally, it is a fair argument that education and research paid for with taxpayer's money should be accessible for more people and reused in new settings.

Here, you find, a symposium for librarians lead by Alma Swan - an open access expert - with focus on the economic aspects of open access:  http://libconference.library.unt.edu/2011/2011_OAS_P3fl.html
She refers to an interesting study (2011) of "return to research" in Denmark. The study illustrates how important open access is for the innovation in small and medium-sized enterprises. So, actually open access is also business.

The symposium is a great example of how Skype can be used as a great platform for presentations and interactions.

Reference
Houghton, J.W., Swan, A. and Brown, S. (2011), Access to Research and Technical Information in Denmark, Report to The Danish Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (FI) and Denmark's Electronic Research Library (DEFF), Copenhagen.
http://www.fi.dk/publikationer/2011/adgang-til-forskningsresultater-og-teknisk-information-i-danmark