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Two courses at the UC have been awarded with the Honourable Mention of the Open Education Consortium

The courses concerned are ‘Introduction to Sustainable Construction’ and ‘Canon Law on Marriage for Civil Jurists’
Academic
2/27/2017

Two courses at the UC have been awarded with the Honourable Mention of the Open Education ConsortiumOpen courses run by the University of Cantabria are to be congratulated. The quality of their content and the professionalism of the lecturers responsible for them have been recognised by the Open Education Consortium, an organisation registered in the United States, operating worldwide to draw together educational institutions that support an approach to open education for everyone.

In this edition, the courses 'Introduction to Sustainable Construction' and 'Canon Law on Marriage for Civil Jurists' have been recognised with an Honourable Mention by the Consortium, together with three other educational resources from the United States, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. These honourable mentions are to be added to the Open Education Educator Award for Excellence received by a Professor at the School of Nursing of the UC, Carmen Sarabia, for her "exceptional dedication to high quality teaching and learning and a commitment to the ideals of Open Education" (more information).

According to Sergio Martínez, Director of the E-learning Support Unit, the University of Cantabria has an extensive record of awards for its open courses, demonstrating the quality of their contents, with honourable mentions in recent years. To this recognition, this year we must add the best international educator award which, for Mr. Martínez, highlights "the effort made by professors to actively participate in open courses".

The MOOC (acronym in English for Massive Open Online Course) 'Introduction to Sustainable Construction' has, to date, more than 12,000 participants. It is taught in English and Spanish by professors of the Construction Technology Applied Research Group (GITECO) at the University of Cantabria, led by the Full Professor Francisco Ballester from the School of Civil Engineering in Santander.

This course stands out for the use of interviews to international experts as an educational complement to theoretical content, as well as for including collaboration from professors from all over Europe of the Master in Construction Research Technology and Management in Europe.

The OpenCourseWare (OCW) course 'Canon Law on Marriage for Civil Jurists'  is run by Joaquín Mantecón. Since being launched, in August 2016, the course has received almost 2,000 visits, of which more than 80% are from outside Spain, mainly from Mexico, Colombia and Peru.

Mantecón has extensive experience in open education, as he also teaches the course 'Religious Pluralism, State and Law' and 'Ecclesiastical Law of the State', in MiriadaX.

The MOOC and OCW courses of the UC are developed by the E-learning Support Unit and the New Technology Training Centre, pertaining to the Vice-rectorate for Academic Affairs and Teaching Staff.