Africa Teacher Education Network Case Study

To facilitate broad take-up and use of the concept of open educational resources (OER) in higher education systems across Africa, OER Africa, has, wherever possible, sought to build relationships with existing networks of educational organizations and individuals. The aim is to provide support of different kinds both to the networks and to individual organizations participating in them. One type of support was collaborative networks, of which the African Teacher Education OER Network (ATEN) was one.

OER Africa and the Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (TESSA) project worked together to establish ATEN in 2010 as a way of promoting OER, facilitating dialogue and sharing existing teacher education content as OER. ATEN was a loosely connected group of teacher educators whose aim was to encourage understanding, use, and sharing of OER to support teacher education and development in Africa. Participants in the network were from several countries in West, East, and Southern Africa, viz., Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Nigeria, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, and Zambia, as well as the UK and USA. The initiative was operational for two years from 2010 to 2012.

This summary is based on desktop research, as well as an interview with the project manager involved in ATEN at the time.