MOOC for Professional development: an effective, low-cost experience

Abstract

Librarians must be constantly up-to-date to keep pace with the demands of a changing professional landscape, beginning from LIS school and continuing lifelong. Research showed that MOOCs are well suited to specific needs, therefore this tool was chosen in Italy in 2018 by AIB, Associazione Italiana Biblioteche (the Italian Librarians’ association), to comply with the pressing demands from its associates in view of the professional validation deadline. Though the validation procedure had been started in 2014, the competence-based scheme developed since was about to be tested for the first time. Since 2014, AIB had been investing in the blended learning approach, delivering courses on the Moodle platform Aibformazione.it, and forming up e-tutors and CPD experts among members. In 2018 it tested a full on-line experience with the course “Gli strumenti per l’attestazione professionale AIB” (AIB tools for Professional Validation), to make courses more accessible and low-cost. In November 2018 the MOOC-like course was proposed to train in one instance many people from different Italian regions before the validation deadline in January 2019. AIB moved from a blended learning to a totally on-line approach, using the platform for the whole learning path - from video-lessons to “workshop” tools - to promote a critical attitude and develop the sense of belonging to a learning community. The MOOC model had no precedents in the Italian LIS CPD landscape: it proved the platform’s flexibility and underlined the advantages coming from the use of a virtual learning space. In future, the platform could be used to host different courses, tailored to varying needs; similarly, the course organisation could be modified to be adapted to specific course demands, in every professional branch.