OpenLearn's 'Race and Ethnicity Hub' wins prestigious award

The Open University’s (OU) free learning site, OpenLearn has won an award at this year’s Open Education Awards for Excellence for it’s Race and Ethnicity Hub, which was launched following the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020.

Winner of the ‘Diversity, Equity and Inclusion‘ award for its outstanding contribution to the open education community, the Race and Ethnicity Hub is a collection of existing and new resources, from articles, videos, audios, timelines and courses, that explore the themes of race, racism and ethnicity across the core faculty areas within the OU.

It was thought in the wake of heightened concerns over black lives, after George Floyd’s murder and considering the disproportionate effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on people from a Black Asian and Minority Ethnic background, that an open educational resource should be developed that collated expertise on race and ethnicity. The hub was created not only for general learning and personal interest to everyone, but also to directly inform Black Asian and Minority Ethnic OU staff and students on topics that might impact their wellbeing and mental health.

It was believed that presenting these resources on OpenLearn, a free platform hosted by the OU, would be the ideal way to ensure these materials were accessible to everyone and played a part in celebrating diversity, promoting racial justice and equity, whilst learning from history, and educating ourselves and others.

Launched in November 2020 with only 48 pieces of content, the hub now has 175 pieces of free educational content. Some of the hub’s content also sits on OpenLearn’s YouTube channel, so that this important resource can reach an even wider, global audience.

One of the lead creators of the hub, Sas Amoah, commented:

“The OpenLearn team and The Race and Ethnicity Hub working group are delighted to have won the 2022 Open Education Award for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. When we launched the hub, we were unsure if there would be an appetite for this type of content but we’ve been blown away by the level of interest and engagement from across the university over the last two years.

“There are currently over 175 pieces of content with contributions from staff and students and we’re keen to see this number grow so please keep an eye out for one of our regular requests for new submissions.”

Congratulations to everyone involved in the hub, particularly; Georgia Axtell-Powell, Hannah Parish, Ayesha Peeran and Sas Amoah.