OSOS, Open Schools for Open Societies
An open school is a more engaging environment for learning and makes a vital contribution to the community.
The OSOS (Open Schools for Open Societies) project enables schools to become active members within their community. An open school is a more engaging environment for learning and makes a vital contribution to the community. Student projects meet real needs of the community outside school and draw upon local expertise and experience. Learning in and together with the real world creates more meaning and more motivation for learners and teachers.
OSOS supports schools to make vital contributions to their communities. Student (technical) projects meet real needs, are presented publicly, and draw upon local expertise and experience.
The school environment fosters collaboration and mentoring, and provides opportunities for learners to understand and interrogate their place in the world.
Basic information
- Cité de l'espace, France
- The University of Deusto, Spain
- Dublin City University, Ireland
- ESHA, European Network of School Leaders
- The Bloomfield Science Museum Jerusalem, Israel
- Fondazione Idis-Città della Scienza, Italy
- INTRASOFT International, Luxembourg
- NEMO Science Museum, Netherlands
- ORT Israel, Israel
- Science View, Greece
- The University of Bayreuth, Germany
- The University of Turku, Finland
- Foundation Open Science, Bulgaria
- Ciência Viva, Portugal
- The European Physical Society, European
- NUCLIO - Núcleo Physics Society Interativo de Astronomia, Portugal
- Curtin University, Australia
- MIT Office of Digital Learning, USA
According to the “Science Education for Responsible Citizenship” report (European Commission, 2015) there are a series of ways in which education can help European countries to equip citizens, enterprise and industry with the skills and competences needed to provide sustainable and competitive solutions to current and future challenges. The OSOS (Open Schools for Open Societies) project is in full harmony with the main recommendations of the report, aiming at presenting a framework that:
- Enhances collaboration among formal, non-formal and informal education providers, enterprises and civil society, to ensure relevant and meaningful engagement of all societal actors with science and increase the uptake of science studies and science-based careers, employability and competitiveness.
- Supports a range of activities based on collaboration among formal, non-formal and informal education providers, enterprises and civil society in order to integrate the concept of open schooling, including all educational levels, in science education.
- Promotes “Open schooling” where schools, in cooperation with other stakeholders, become agents of community well-being.
- Encourages families to become real partners in school life and activities.
- Involves professionals from enterprises and civil and wider society in bringing real-life projects to the classroom. Partnerships that foster expertise, networking, sharing and applying science and technology research findings across different enterprises (start-ups, SMEs, larger corporations) will be promoted.
The OSOS (Open Schools for Open Societies) project uses the Inspiring Science Education services enabling and guiding teachers to participate in a dynamic network of international communities. These communities are internally and flexibly structured and organised, based on the activities and content that each community implements, uses and publishes, and enable teachers to organise their groups or classrooms in terms of students and content, learning scenarios and tools.
Using these tools, schools are supported to build and organise their own profile and workspace in the platform and to support different users’ involvement under their school communities and professional development. These tools are considered as distinct components “added” under each community created in the platform, with relevance to the learning concept/discipline/context they are designed for by their managers/creators.
It is expected that towards the end of the project, the OSOS online communities will include a rich collection of learning resources and applications that will facilitate the effective introduction of OSOS Best Practices in school practice.