The Commonwealth of Learning’s President and CEO Professor Asha Kanwar congratulates Nigeria on the adoption of a COL-supported National Policy on Open Educational Resources (OER). The pioneering policy was validated at a Stakeholders’ Validation Symposium at the National Universities Commission in Abuja, and will be sent to Nigeria’s National Council on Education for approval.

Professor Kanwar said: “OER have tremendous potential for reducing the costs and improving the quality of education. I congratulate Nigeria for developing a national policy on OER in record time. This will have implications for millions of students and a positive impact on the quality of education in the country.”

The first draft of the policy was prepared on behalf of the Commonwealth of Learning by Dr Jane-Frances Agbu of the National Open University of Nigeria. It was then reviewed and revised by Nigeria’s National Steering Committee on OER, before being sent for validation.

Dr Sanjaya Mishra, COL Education Specialist: eLearning, who provided inputs into the policy, said: “The comprehensive policy covers all the elements for mainstreaming OER in higher education in Nigeria, including teaching and learning, capacity building, OER material development, and quality assurance. It is hoped that other countries will look to this policy as input for developing one appropriate to their context.”

The National Universities Commissions also recently launched the Nigerian University System Open Educational Resources, a repository for all OER held by Nigeria’s 153 universities. It currently contains over 2 million OER, including those that are unique to Nigeria and Africa.