I was reluctant to watch it after the mental upset the first Zeitgeist caused me, but watch it I did. It is 2 hours long and pretty riveting.

We intend to restore the fundamental necessities and environmental awareness of the species through the avocation of the most current understandings of who and what we truly are, coupled with how science, nature and technology (rather than religion, politics and money) hold the keys to our personal growth, not only as individual human beings, but as a civilization, both structurally and spiritually. The central insights of this awareness is the recognition of the Emergent and Symbiotic elements of natural law and how aligning with these understandings as the bedrock of our personal and social institutions, life on earth can and will flourish into a system which will continuously grow in a positive way, where negative social consequences, such as social stratification, war, biases, elitism and criminal activity will be constantly reduced and, idealistically, eventually become nonexistent within the spectrum of human behavior itself.

In the first 25 minutes Peter Joseph takes another punt at explaining the money system as it works in the USA and more or less the same in many parts of the world. He does better this time around than in the original Zeitgeist movie, revisiting ideas that money is debt and debt is slavery, and relating it to todays concerns around interest and inflation. The next 30 or so minutes focus on John Perkins and his terrible testimony as an economic hitman helping to assert US control around the world through the creation of debt and corruption. Then it goes utopia (nothing wrong with hope for the future is there?) with Jacque Fresco with Roxanne Meadows talking about the Venus Project. And finally Peter proposes what we must do to free ourselves from this very ordinary existence, starting with careful self observation.

I must admit, I had a tear rolling down my face at the end there, partly through reflection of just how shitty this set up is, and partly at the realisation of just how impossible it is to bring about meaningful change that might just make it a little less shitty for a few more of us. Then again, this movie is bold in its hope, why shouldn’t I be also? Perhaps the new age is arriving, perhaps there is a change coming, the long anticipated age of aquarius is due soon, perhaps just as the moon affects the oceans, our women and our moods, the sun’s orbit and the Earth’s precession is about to affect us in a similarly big way.

Now, I realise there would be quite a few very pragmatic, teacherly types rolling their eyes at me again… “oh gawd, what’s Leigh saying now”… but this post is just notes really. The movie, like the last, has had an affect on me - I can say that much, and it has motivated me to want to learn about stuff. I’ll just have to turn down the volume of all the inevitable nay sayers, not so I can’t hear them, just so I can hear myself.
About to develop another model for open access education

October 20, 2008 in OER, contentdevelopment, flexiblelearning, freelearning, otago polytechnic | 6 comments

Going out of business sale CC By: heiwa4126

Last week, our Business School took a day to meet, along with truth about enzyteexternal people like myself, and business and community spokes people, to discuss the future of the School and its services. It was interesting to participate in the process. While it had its boggy patches and sensitive areas, it was good to see by the end of the day there seemed to be a small group turned onto an idea for a new focus in the school.

One thing that came out of it for me was the opportunity to float ideas relating to open education and the business school.
Certificates, Diplomas and Degrees to the back please

No Microsoft, Please CC By: Steve Keys

The idea I expressed that has attracted some interest was one where we invert the normal thinking of what it means to get a formal education. To take the “certificates, diplomas and degrees” part of what we do and put it in the back, and put the content and the learning activities up front. This is in response to common feedback from students where they want to know what is IN the course, what will they learn, how applied is it? Is it relevant? In my opinion, the package of certificates, diplomas and degrees give no real answer to inquiries to learning, worse - they limit educational development to a particular set of assumptions relating to that framework for learning.
Planning for Sustainable Small Management course

The Bombay Dabawalla CC By: JimReeves

Hillary Jenkins is the program manager for the Diploma in Applied Travel and Tourism - otherwise known as Travel and Tourism (probably to become just Tourism soon). This course (for some strange reason) sits inside the Business School. That aside, Hillary is keen on the idea of “inverting” the package to one that envelops a wide range of interests in learning - starting with one of the courses inside her programme: Planning for Small Business.

Our first step was to find out what else was going on in Dunedin, Otago in terms of courses and support for people planning for small business. We didn’t want to go ahead and set something up that was in competition with others, and I don’t rightly know why something like a short stand alone course in planning for small business didn’t already exist in the Business School. So we called a meeting with the likely candidates of stakeholders in such a course. The Chamber of Commerce, NZ Trade and Enterprise, local business incubator Kick Start, a number of Polytechnic lecturers to assess the level of interest.

Our meeting was first see if us setting up a short stand alone course in planning for small business would be in competition, or could be complimentary to existing courses and services. We found that it would not be in competition and could be highly complimentary to existing services around town. The next part was discuss the aspect of this new course that would be unique, planning for small business with triple bottom line sustainability in mind. We aim to develop a course that will assist people in planning for a sustainable small business.

To do this we are currently in negotiation with NZ Trade and Enterprise to obtain copyrights to make a derivative of their already excellent guide Planning for Success. Planning for Success is a template for a business plan with supporting information attached to it. We want to make a derivative from this that will incorporate triple bottom line accounting as well as sustainability information for use in the business plan marketing and objective statements. We would also record seminars and presentations to compliment the resource. The derivative will of course be developed with the Wikibook that is already in development. We’ll make a printed and bound version for sale - all carrying the Creative Commons Attribution License (meaning NZTE would be free to take a version further if they wanted).

I’m getting to the new model now…
Enveloped learning

little max and the wow factor CC By: Lady Orlando

Once we have a text to structure a course around, we then want to set up a calendar of informative events that relate to that text and the courses we have. The events would be things like seminars from the Inland Revenue Department on business registration through to tax and levies; presentations from different insurance brokers; presentations from local business’; workshops from local services; etc etc. A range of short 30 minute to 1 hour events that are open to the public and enrolled students, and that have direct relevance to planning for a sustainable small business according to the text.

These short events link to slightly longer events such as a 3 hour workshop in spreadsheets; a day long tour of existing business; a consultation period with a service; a business plan writing workshop over 5 nights. These slightly more involved events are credited towards the course in Planning for Small Business - at which point the certificates and diplomas start to become relevant to participants, as they align to assessment for such credentials.

Examples: Take the perspective of someone in the community who already has full time job, but is interested in developing a small business idea. This person would have access to the short informative events and content of the formal course This type of access scales without diminishing the experience of formally enrolled participants or costing the Polytechnic anything that marketing or social development funding couldn’t account for - the old open lecture format. From the perspective of an enrolled student (which in Hillary’s course tends to be a young school leaver), they are attending informative events that make up the content of what they need to know to complete the learning activities, such as the Writing a Business Plan workshop, but with the extra perspective of it being of interest to a wider public attending the open lecture. From the perspective of the course coordinator, it is an opportunity to see a wider range of people participating in this level of content and to promote participation in the slightly more involved learning activities in the course. There is no commitment or enrolment to a certificate, diploma or degree at these events and activities. Just short, one off, regularly available, open access workshops to assist people.