Topic proposals

This issue is relevant for teachers, students, university deans and CIOs as well as the national NRENs. It is a future activity that will gain more importance in the future....e.t.c.

jasmijn.wijn@surfnet.nl (on leave from 19 September till 14 October 2019)

wietze.de.vries@ki.se

In the society of the future, boundaries between institutions fade. Students want to study outside of their own institution, even international. They are interested in a variety of different courses or they want to combine subjects that cannot be found within a single institution.  Moreover, education institutions are offering joint programmes.

To facilitate mobility, students must be uniquely identifiable across institutions. In that way, different institutions can be certain that they are dealing with the same student and can share a student's academic results. The eduID is lifelong available, owned by the student and starts out as a (self-created) basic identity. Assurance can be increased and enhanced by authoritative sources, like institutions or the government.

In the Netherlands, SURF is creating a disruptive concept called eduID. Besides the trust & identity aspects of such an ID, eduID has deep impact on all kind of educational processes inside and between institutions. It would be great to explore the possibilities of cooperating within GEANT to align international eduID initiatives.

Michiel.Schok@surfnet.nl

Traditional NREN is increasing its service portfolio within education solutions. Many of these services are quite different from traditional services in NRENs. Much is about joint procurement, follow-up of major international suppliers, influence and development of major solutions used in an international education market, risk management, collaboration on joint work processes, facilitation of collaboration on training and experience sharing between universities, development of joint integrations, etc.

Some questions that may be interesting to discuss:

-What tasks should we solve within edu services?
-What distinguishes these from the core activities of an NREN?
-Where to draw the line between traditional NREN services and EDU services, eg. media services?
-What are the advantages and disadvantages of organizing edu services in a separate body or company.

At SURF we strongly believe that open badges enable micro-credentialing and therefore are the new digital currency for learning that fit well within a rapidly changing educational system. We see an increasing demand for a more transparent and flexible curriculum, which better suits the personal ambition- and qualification level of the individual student and meet the needs of employers.

• Why it is important for all of us?
1. Digital credentials will provide a more flexible and transparent approach to curriculum and grading for all learners 
1. Digital badges help the education system to become more flexible (mobility, life-long learning)
2. Ability to support students in a continuous way and granular level 
3. Make data verifiable: need trusted digital data, ability to validate,
4. Comprehensive learning record in the US (100), competence profile in the EU (knowledge, skill, ability)
5. Collaboration needed to make the included metadata aligned across Europe
   
   
• Why should we discuss / collaborate about it internationally? or How can joint collaboration support building a healthier and more sustainable service? (link to the lifecycle model)
1. Technical implementation
1. Align metadata, use of AI to extend services, ID needed as anchor
2. Vision formulation and support: 
1. Policy for data management in a situation where 1) students have control of their data, 2) institutions control data they assign, 3) 3rd parties verify shared information
3. Employment and use
1. Persistency of data crucial, however loss will happen
2. Aligning national infrastructures to badge service development and production model 
4. Purchase and development
1. Collaboration is most valuable early on in the technology lifecycle
2. Will influence future technology design
   
   
• What should be our next steps?
  
1. Sharing knowledge about related activities at NRENs
2. Find valuable use cases for NRENs across the field
3. Link NRENs and their needs to metadata and standards work
4. Collaborate on technology to build a badging solution and to verify interoperability

frans.ward@surfnet.nl

alexander.blanc@surfnet.nl