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The Long Shortlist of Finalists for the 2023 OEAwards

Now in its 13th year, the Open Education Awards for Excellence again provides recognition for the people, resources, and practices in Open Education through a community-driven process.

From an open call for nominations that opened in May, we collected 172 nominations across the 16 award categories, representing people and projects from 38 countries. Next, our review committee, which includes 20 former award winners combined with the input of the OEGlobal Board of Directors, gets us to the current stage. It’s time to meet the finalists for the 2023 OEAwards!

In the spirit of widening the scope of recognition, like last year, we are first announcing the OEAwards shortlist of finalists highlighting the achievements of 15 individuals and 34 open education initiatives and practices that are contenders for the awards.

Take some time to scan the 2023 OEAwards Finalists organized by the award categories or as listed below. Please show your appreciation by replying to or reposting our @OEGlobal social media messages. Please use the hashtag #OEAwards23 or reply to this announcement in our OEG Connect Awards space (you access the Connect page below).

What’s next? The final award winners will be announced in an OEG Live webcast at 17:00 UTC on September 13 (check for local time). The special session for OEAwardees at the November 16-18 OEGlobal Conference in Edmonton will also be live-streamed.

And now… take in the long list of our finalists below or explore them more (with links) in the OEAwards website gallery of the 2023 Finalists.

PEOPLE IN OPEN (Individual Awards)

Catalyst Award

This award is presented to an individual actively engaged in promoting the creation and implementation of OER and application Open Practices. A Catalyst is someone other than a professor/teacher who supports the ideals of the Open Education movement through their own practices and who creates engagement in Openness within an organization or community.

  • Abbey Elder
  • Kathy Essmiller
  • Jonathan Poritz
  • Jennryn Wetzler

Educator Award

This award honors an innovative teacher/professor who has published and/or used a significant body of Open Resources and/or applied Open Practices over a sustained period (at least one year) in their teaching practice. This individual’s open course materials and professional practices have been recognized for impacting student learning and influencing peers to share more openly.

  • Maha Bali
  • James Brunton

Student Award

This award recognizes the outstanding endeavors of a student who has advocated for or benefitted academically from using open educational resources or open educational practices. It is presented to a student whose achievements may inspire others to pursue degree programs that utilize open resources and/or someone who played a prominent role in advocating successfully for the promotion and advancement of open education.

  • Henry Agnew, Ethan Turner, and Matthew Barkovich
  • Yasser Tamer Atef

Leadership Award

This award is presented to an individual who has demonstrated significant leadership and longstanding involvement with Open Education. This person has made significant and clear contributions to the furtherance of the Open Education movement, with contributions to Open Education that have spanned regions and/or had a global impact.

  • Catherine Cronin
  • Patrina Law
  • Lisa Petrides
  • Martin Weller

WHAT WE SHARE (Open Asset Awards)

Open Curation / Repository Award

This award is given to an exceptional collection of high-quality open materials made available via a process of curation or review. More than merely collecting content on a specific subject, strong curation involves carefully selecting content. evaluating it for specific purposes, and making it available in a meaningful way that can then be customized and re-shared for other people..

  • Mada ICT-AID Competency Framework Aligned OER Hub
  • Proyecto EDIA
  • Storyweaver
  • VCCS Transfer Course Mapping Hub

Open Infrastructure Award

This award is for implementing or developing a set of technologies that encompass open-source tools for creating open educational resources, use in an educational context, curation, improvement, and reuse, as well as sharing. The “infrastructure” is broader than open-source software; it also includes open hardware, open standards enabling interoperability, and other open technologies that are instrumental in enabling open education.

  • convOERter (OER Conversion Tool)
  • Openverse

Open Reuse / Remix / Adaptation Award

This award is given to an exceptional collection of high-quality open materials made available via a process of curation or review. More than merely collecting content on a specific subject, robust curation involves carefully selecting content. evaluating it for specific purposes, and making it available in a meaningful way that can then be customized and re-shared for other people.

  • 《少年的自我療傷—甘耀明《殺鬼》少年圖書改編》客家語多媒體教材(“Multimedia Open Textbook for Self-Healing of a Teenager: a Picture Book Adapted from Ghost Slayer by Gan Yaoming” )
  • Français inclusif
  • HUM 1: Modern Humanities on Manifold
  • LIDA103fr (Learning in a digital age 103fr: Open education, copyright and open licensing in a digital world)

Significant Impact OER Award

This award recognizes high-quality, innovative teaching and learning materials openly shared that have significantly impacted accessibility, distribution, remix, learning, or social change. These include but are not limited to Open Courses, Open Textbooks, Videos / Simulations / Animations, Audio / Audiobook, etc.

  • American Government Audiobook
  • Futurum Careers’ educational resources
  • Universal Design for Learning (UDL) for Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility (IDEA)
  • Understanding Homelessness in Canada: From the Street to the Classroom

HOW WE SHARE (Open Practice Awards)

Open Collaboration Award

This award goes to an environment that fosters the collective production of open resources and open practices with a shared goal. Such places allow for an interchange of ideas supported through technologically mediated collaborative platforms, encourage new opportunities for people to form ties with others and create things together, and expand diverse goals, backgrounds, and cultures.

  • Exercise and Physical Activity in Indigenous Health
  • The National Teaching Repository
  • Regional Leaders of Open Education Network (RLOE)
  • STEAM OER LATAM Community

Open Pedagogy Award

This award highlights innovative open teaching practices that incorporate openness in multiple levels of the learning process. Open Pedagogy engages in the production, use, and reuse of content and demonstrates effective open teaching practices and ways of educating that increase access to learning and address equity and fairness.

  • Buds, Branches and Bark: A Guide to Winter Identification in the Pacific Northwest
  • Open for Inclusive Excellence
  • Open for Antiracism Program
  • Competendo Digital Toolbox

Open Policy Award

This award goes to an environment that fosters the collective production of open resources and open practices with a shared goal. Such places allow for an interchange of ideas supported through technologically mediated collaborative platforms, encourage new opportunities for people to form ties with others and create things together, and expand diverse goals, backgrounds, and cultures.

  • Washington OER and Low-Cost Labeling Policies

Open Research Award

This award recognizes research studies or initiatives about open education and/or related areas that help advance our understanding of and demonstrate effectiveness related to the challenges of the Open Education movement. Recognized efforts apply attributes of Openness in the research and dissemination processes.

  • Annual Top 10 “Good Reads” in Open Access Journals in Digital Education
  • OpenResearchLab
  • Special Issue of the Journal for Multicultural Education

SPECIAL AWARDS (Open Practice Awards)

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Award

This award recognizes creativity, innovation, and the creation of opportunities that promote a welcoming and supportive diverse environment and facilitate inclusion and/or access.  Examples are ones that develop cultural awareness and foster intercultural communication and collaboration.

  • A People’s History of Structural Racism in Academia: From A(dministration of Justice) to Z(oology)
  • Enhancing Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEA) in Open Educational Resources (OER)
  • GO-GN EDI Guidelines: Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Open Education with a focus on Africa and Latin America
  • Maamwi Hub

Open Resilience Award

This award honors practices that have found the best ways of overcoming adversity in the face of unprecedented challenges or crises. Activities that clearly demonstrate the implementation of open educational resources or open educational practices to address challenges arising in any crisis.

  • Academic Development Open Virtual Hub (ADOVH)
  • Responsive OER for Ukrainians

Wildcard Award

Awards ought to be open themselves! This new award is open to recognizing something or someone not entirely covered by any other category. Create your own award criteria, and help recognize everything possible in open education.

  • “Is this an OER?” Addressing the Complex Relationship between Open and Affordable Course Materials
  • “We Like Sharing” Open Photo Competition

Once again, winners will be announced in an OEG Live webcast on September 13. Save the date!

Learn about the finalists in more detail


Share Your Comments in OEG Connect

What do you think of the shortlisted finalists? Add to the discussions below and share your experiences of these people and platforms.

OEG Voices – Latest Podcasts

OE Global Voices

Welcome to the home of podcasts produced by Open Education Global. These shows bring you insight and connection to the application of open education practices from around the world. Listen at podcast.oeglobal.org

Audio Player
OE Global Voices
OEG Voices 078: Significant Impact OER Award Winner Frontiers for Young Minds
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OEG Voices 078: Significant Impact OER Award Winner Frontiers for Young Minds

Put this episode of OE Global Voices on your “Must Listen List” and be prepared for waves of inspiration and awe for Frontiers for Young Minds, an outstanding project that publishes on the order of 250 papers a year on complex areas of science. But more importantly, these papers are written for kids and reviewed by kids in a process that, when you hear it, will make it clear why Frontiers for Young Minds was recognized with a 2024 Open Education Award for Excellence in the Significant Impact category.

Frontiers for Young Minds https://kids.frontiersin.org/

Frontiers for Young Minds believes that the best way to make cutting-edge science discoveries available to younger audiences is to enable young people and scientists to work together to create articles that are both top quality and exciting.

Distinguished scientists are invited to write about their discoveries in a language that is accessible for young readers, and it is then up to the kids themselves – with the help of a science mentor – to provide feedback and explain to the authors how to best improve the articles before publication.

This unique process produces a collection of freely available scientific articles by leading scientists, shaped for younger audiences by the input of their own young peers.

https://kids.frontiersin.org/about/journal/

In this episode we will learn more about the journal and its publishing process, but also dive into an example of how a paper on the science of secrets was drafted by clinical psychologists at Erasmus University Rotterdam (The Netherlands), reviewed by kids in the Science Club at Disley Primary School (United Kingdom) mentored by neuroscientist Caroline Lea-Carnall at the University of Manchester (United Kingdom) and then published in the Frontiers for Young Minds journal as Shhh! What Are Secrets and How Do They Affect Us?

In the podcast recording studio with top row, left to right) Laura Henderson and Hedwig Ens (Frontiers for Young Minds) and bottom row,Caroline Lea-Carnall (University of Manchester), Ildikó Csizmazia and Minita Franzen (Erasmus University Rotterdam).

In This Episode

FYI: For the sake of experimentation and the spirit of transparency, this set of show notes alone was generated by the AI “Underlord” in the Descript editor we use to produce OEGlobal Voices.

In this episode of OE Global Voices, host Alan Levine delves into the inspirational story behind the award-winning project, “Frontiers for Young Minds,” which uniquely involves children in the peer-review process of scientific articles aimed at young readers. Alan engages with key figures including Laura Henderson, head of the program, along with contributors and reviewers Caroline Lea-Carnall, Hedwig Ens, Ildikó Csizmazia, and Minita Franzen. They discuss the project’s origins, its mission to make complex scientific concepts accessible and engaging for kids, and the enriching experience it provides for both young reviewers and established scientists. The conversation highlights the project’s significant impact on science communication and education, celebrating its collaborative spirit and success in fostering a new generation of science enthusiasts.

  • Intro Music, Opening Quotes, and Welcome
  • Meet the Guests: Laura Henderson and Team
  • The Origin Story of Frontiers for Young Minds
  • The Review Process: Kids as Gatekeepers
  • The Impact of the Project on Kids and Scientists
  • Future Plans and Closing Remarks

(end of AI generated show notes)

Additional Links and Quotes for Episode 78

 It was very interesting to see their thinking was about the whole idea. There were places where we [thought] this might be an important part to share, but there is not really much research on that so we cannot say anything.

So I just didn’t [add] anything in the article. And then kids were like, “Okay, but can you tell us something about it? Is there research on it?” I liked that feedback.

They also picked up on the positive things — this made us enthusiastic to continue to incorporate their feedback. And we really thought we are contributing and doing something that younger readers also find very important.

Ildikó Csizmazia on responding to the reviewers

One of the great privileges of our work is that we work with the most engaged, the most passionate people, the researchers, the science mentors, the kids themselves. It’s a kind of self-selecting group who come to be part of what we do. And the real common thread is always that passion and that engagement.

So it gives us energy and thank you to everybody who’s been part of our process, the people here on this call today, so Ildikó, Minita, Caroline, but also all of our authors, science mentors, editors, young reviewers who’ve been part of our process over the years.

We’ve worked with about 900 editors and 9,000 plus young reviewers in 65 countries and however many authors, it’s, an incredible number of authors.

Laura Henderson, Frontiers for Young Minds


Our open licensed music for this episode is a track calledScience Summit by Serge Quadrado licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License. Like most of our podcast music, it was found at the Free Music Archive (see our full FMA playlist).

Finally, this was another episode we are recording on the web in Squadcast, part of the Descript platform for AI enabled transcribing and editing audio in text– this has greatly enhanced our ability to produce our showsWe have been exploring some of the other AI features in Descriptbut our posts remain human authored except where indicated otherwise.