Attending educational conferences is often very costly in terms of time and budgets, yet there are clear advantages for promoting student learning in face-to-face meetings, sometimes through unexpected channels. An informal conversation about open education by a University of Cape Town (UCT) staff member at an international conference in 2015 has now led to a trans-disciplinary inter-institutional collaborative initiative between UCT’s Health Sciences Faculty (HSF) and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).
Through online engagement with stakeholders at LSHTM, the E-Learning Division in the Educational Development Unit in the HSF has initiated an ongoing process of localizing, developing and running an established massive open online course (MOOC) on the topic of eye health. This MOOC was previously designed for primarily developed countries however recognition of the need to expand into impoverished regions has led to this new initiative.
Despite a fairly low budget, this project aims to promote and expand eye health education through Africa to reduce preventable conditions of blindness. As part of the process we have involved visually impaired persons, drawing on their ideas and expertise in the development of the six week course. This collaboration has led to a research project in which we are evaluating the factors that have facilitated transforming a massive open online course. The online learning resource is designed to target service providers and is in the process of being made accessible to the blind and visually impaired.
We draw on political feminist Nancy Fraser’s theoretical concepts to explain how our project has shifted institutional arrangements and curricular materials to advance social justice in terms of education and health. Using her normative framework we explore how redistribution, recognition and representation for a wider target population can contribute to an affirmative and transformed educational programme that advances health for all.
