Conversation with Leigh Blackall
August 27, 2009, [MD]
I've
been aware of Leigh Blackall for a
long time, and have found his work and writings consistently very
inspiring and interesting. Leigh works for Otago
Polytechnic, which is an inspiring example
of how an institution can "go open" (see their
mini-documentary).
I remember emailing him during last Open Education conference, saying
that I had seen him on the pre-conference wiki, and was excited to be
meeting him, and he wrote back that unfortunately he wouldn't be
attending anyway.
Funnily enough, this year, he did come to the Open Education conference in Vancouver, and I did see him, but he always seemed busily engaged with very interesting people, so I never got chance to introduce myself (never took the chance, anyway). The Open Ed conferences are often like that - everyone are busily trying to reconnect with people, or meet with people they have read or communicated with, it's like a social dance.
However, thanks to the beauty of the internet, we finally got connected, Leigh had a look at some of my stuff, and he invited me to have a conversation about some of the ideas we are both thinking about. He recorded the conversation, and made it available on archive.org (about one hour: mp3, ogg, or listen below).
It was an interesting discussion, although far too short. We talked a bit about my research on the Chinese OER program (I gave a presentation about this in Vancouver), the issue of open licenses in non-Western countries (which I will blog about separately), the Peer2Peer University, and more. He has already invited me to repeat the experiment, this time talking more about his experience at Otago, which I am very eager to find out more about.
Stian
Stian Håklev August 27, 2009 Toronto, Canada comments powered by Disqus