Open educational resources for research training: quality assurance through a collaborative evaluation

Abstract

Although it is considered that open educational resources offer vast pedagogical opportunities for any educational context, there have been only few studies so far that have linked their use or application in the field of research training, and even less works that have addressed their quality assurance for that context. As part of an inter-institutional project, the main aim of this article is the collaborative selection and evaluation of appropriate educational resources for research training. The mixed method approach of the article includes needs’ analysis of researchers in training through questionnaires and interviews. This was the starting point for the collaborative evaluation of educational resources using the agreed common criteria derived from the Learning Object Review Instrument (LORI) evaluation instrument. This article suggests recommendations regarding the collaborative evaluation of educational resources and the use of LORI, and suggestions for creators of educational resources for research training to facilitate the quality assurance of their materials. A website is being developed to bind together the resources that have met the quality criteria established in collaborative evaluation.

Keywords

• evaluation criteria
• higher education
• distance education