Javiera Atenas – Open Education Working Group, Open Knowledge International

Developing Global Citizens: Open Data as Open Educational Resources.

This presentation will offer the participants a theoretical perspective on how and why to use Open Data as a key in the development of cross-functional skills (including digital and data literacy, alongside skills for critical thinking, research, teamwork, and global citizenship), enhancing students’ abilities to understand and select information sources, to work with, curate, analyse and interpret data, and to conduct and evaluate research. The final goal is to provide resources and knowledge support educators in empowering students to engage, critically and collaboratively, as 21st century global citizens.

Valentina Bazzarin - Cognitive Psychology at USAC - University Students Abroad Consortium – (USA)

Open data as a plea to promote open knowledge and participative continuous learning in local health-care settings.

The presentation describes an innovative activity run in the health-care system in the city of Ferrara, between 2015 and 2017, and promoted by the Region Emilia-Romagna. A researcher observed and ethnographically described the cultural and the organizational changes in a local health-care setting during an experimental learning activity aimed to change the internal and the institutional communication of the local public health-care services. The activity involved decision makers, operators, employees and civil society organizations. There were all engaged in a open-data team to promote the re-use of open data produced by the services activities. The results show that the activity affected the organizational structure and culture of the public body making both operators and citizens aware of the "political agency" potential of open knowledge. However the research highlighted also that the re-use of open data requires continuously updated internal policies and dedicated personnel to manage and to distribute the data-flows.

Juliana E. Raffaghelli – Universitat Oberta de Catalunya - Department of Psychology and Education (EPCE)

Learning in the datafied society: from informal to formal learning, a critical perspective.

Overall, in this presentation it will be underlined the fact that living in the datafied society could encompass for children and adults more surveillance and exploitation by those controlling/showing data, instead of more empowerment. However, the audience attention will be driven onto the potential of education and training to heal the above mentioned issues. Some cases will be considered in order to trigger the audience’s reactions, including:

(A) Informal education settings, where the poor digital competences detected in an important part of adult population, could prevent them to participate in e-engagement, monithons, and the overall use of data available connected to their own personal and socio-political life.

(B) formal education settings, where the lack of teachers and educators’ knowledge to deal with the open datasets generated by the public systems or by open science, impact students’ learning and access to them; specifically, it will be shown how open data is often unknown, or it is too far from the learning purposes and the teachers’ learning design competences to make the several transformations required to make open data to become an educational resource.