5 April 2008
The Open Training Platform (OTP) is a UNESCO-powered online collaborative knowledge hub for free training resources for development. It currently has more than 1700 resources produced by over 600 development stakeholders worldwide on various subjects grouped under 21 categories. Through the OTP, partners and communities can share and use materials to support local sustainable development.1. How can you participate?
You can contribute to the Platform’s development by logging in and:
- sharing your resource;
- asking for resources you need through the “Training on demand”;
- informing your partners and networks about the Platform;
- rating the resource you are using;
- forwarding a link to an interested person;
- providing ideas for the improvement of the Platform.
2. What are the OTP comparative advantages?
The OPT is helping you find your way in the myriad of portals through a website, which is:
- collaborative: bringing stakeholders togetehr;
- participative: bringing the target audience on board;
- global: serving local communities for all the challenges they face (e.g. a farmer in Africa not only needs to learn about irrigation but also about HIV AIDS or malaria or micro credit, etc.);
- user friendly: designed to facilitate access to relevant resources as rapidly and as simply as possible; resources are provided in various formats, such as CD-ROM, online pdf, word or HTML, pod casting, published as a book, journal, tutorial, video, etc.;
- free and advocating for open content: the open learning resources portals and wikis existing to date are dedicated to formal education resources or face to face training opportunities;
- non-certifying: OTP resources do not provide course certificates; however, a new corner will be dedicated to e-learning portals to help the OTP visitors find their way in the e-learning offers for development;
- a user needs oriented: offering an up to date Training on Demand service to local communities and responding to their learning needs as soon as possible by finding the training needed through an Internet search and partners’ networks.
3. What does the OTP entail?
The OTP provides information about each training resource, which allows the user to make a decision on whether the module corresponds to his needs:
- type (e.g. guidelines for policy makers, guidelines for trainers, guidelines for specialists, teaching resources for trainers);
- direct access to the resource;
- producers and partners;
- language versions;
- IT literacy required to use the resource; and
4. What can you do with the OPT materials?
The materials contained in the OTP enable professionals, local practitioners and individuals to:
- access free training resources and modules in their respective fields of interest;
- follow online training;
- reuse, modify or localise existing materials where the initial resource copyright allows it;
- disseminate information about the availability of the resource through local networks.
5. How can you promote the OTP?
Promoting the OTP is simple: you have to visit the website and click on “You like the platform, promote it!” In doing so, you will create a link to the OTP on your website and publicise it to your networks or partners.