'Open' Education & Training Resources for Healthcare

There are now a tremendous number of high quality 'Open' Education & Training resources and tools that major healthcare provider organizations, universities, colleges, and medical schools ought to seriously consider exploring. These include 'open source' software, 'open access' materials (textbooks, journals, etc.), 'open data', 'open communities', and much more.

To get a quick overview of the many 'Open' Education & Training tools and resources available, take a few minutes to look at the COSI 'Open' Education & Training web site or COSI 'Open' Health IT Training page.

The following are links to selected 'open source' Education & Training software products and tools we recommend you check out:

• Claroline - An open source eLearning and eWorking platform allowing teachers to build effective online courses and to manage collaborative learning activities on the web.
• Chamilo - A, collaborative, open source Learning Management System (LMS).
• Dokeos - An open source e-Learning software suite.
• DoceboLMS - An open cloud platform for eLearning.
• eFront - An open source e-Learning software suite.
• Evergreen - An open source Integrated Library System (ILS)) currently used by over 800 libraries.
• EthosCE  - A full-featured, open-source learning management system with built-in content authoring and social media features for continuing education and training for organizations.
• iThinkEd - Microsoft's free software tools for helping educators and researchers publish and share information.
• Kaltura - An open source video application platform for education.
• Koha - An open-source Integrated Library System in use today by hundreds of libraries worldwide.
• Kuali - A suite of open source administrative software modules for use in higher education.
• Moodle  - An open source Course Management or Learning Management System.  It is a web application that educators can also use to create effective online learning sites.
• MS Learning Content Development Systems (LCDS) - A free tool that enables the Microsoft Learning community to create high-quality, interactive, online courses
• Online Learning And Training (OLAT) - An open source web-based Learning Management System.
• OpenCourseWare - A collaborative, open source educational content solution.
• Open Learning Exchange ToolKit - A series of software tools that will help Open Learning Exchange (OLE) Centers quickly and inexpensively provide basic education services within their countries.
• OpenSimulator - An open source multi-user 3D application server that can be used to create virtual reality environments, similar to Second Life Education institutions and learning environments.
• Open Source Scripts - This site provides access to a list of available open source education products.
• Sakai  - An open source software for education, research and related scholarly activities.
• uPortal - An open source enterprise portal framework built by and for the higher education community.
• Zotero - A free open source tool to help you collect, organize, cite, and share your research sources.

The following are links to selected 'open access' education & training web sites, resources, publications, and more:

• Bentham Open Access - Over 230 peer-reviewed open access journals covering all major disciplines of science, technology, and more.
• Community College 'Open' Textbooks - Peer reviewed free and open textbooks for use in community college courses.
• Connexions  - Contains educational materials at all levels, organized in small modules that can be connected into larger courses.Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) - A directory of a wide range of freely available, online Open Access Journals covering the arts and sciences.
• Encyclopedia of Life - Providing free and 'open access' to knowledge about life on Earth.
• Health Education Assets Library (HEAL) - A digital library of multimedia teaching resources for the health sciences that resides in the public domain.
• Library of Congress - Recognized as the national library of the U.S. Its collections comprise the world's most comprehensive record of American history, human creativity, and knowledge.
• OER Commons Textbooks - Information about open textbooks offered through Open Education Commons (OER).
• Open Training Platform - UNESCO facilitates collaborative access to existing free and 'open'  training courses and materials via its Open Training Platform.
• O'Reilly Open Books - Publishers of quite a few Open Books--books with various forms of 'open' copyright--over the years.
• Versita Open - One of the world’s leading Open Access platforms, hosting full texts of nearly 200 scholarly journals.
• WikiMedia Commons - An online repository of freely licensed, sharable educational photos and images available on the internet.

* Also check out the video playlists on the Open Health IT Channel on YouTube.

If your organization wants to take advantage of the many high quality 'open source' software solutions, free and 'open access' textbooks and training materials, 'open data' for research purposes, and save a lot of money along the way, you need to find out more about the list of 'Open' Education solutions just provided. 

Do you know of universities or healthcare organizations using some of these 'Open' Education & Training tools? Do you have other great 'open' education solutions you'd like to share with others?

Peter Groen, Senior Editor, Open Health News (OHN)