was originally written to help us define the project for funding
There will be
three parts to the electronic infrastructure of the TheoWeb project:
the one hand, an online
public database of ‘learning objects’ – all sorts
of learning resources, focussing particularly on reusable
chunks of information intended as building blocks for larger
resources (lessons or modules); these objects include text,
audio, graphics and other related multimedia materials.
Complete modules might be included, although the
database is not intended to provide online modules, but
rather to give users the opportunity to create modules
appropriate to their needs and suitable for their contexts. The database will be accessed with a sophisticated
search engine designed with context, learning outcomes, and
scope and sequencing tools to enable the users to adapt the
materials to their needs.
the other hand, an open source online
learning environment built to enable effective use of
the learning objects, which could be downloaded to any
computer system, whether individual or institutional, and
which would then provide the platform for organising and
using the learning objects.
advanced research, a repository
of digitised content not otherwise available to enable
scholars and other interested individuals to work with
materials that would otherwise have required them to travel
to the places where the original documents or artifacts are
digitised content to be held in the TheoWeb database would
enable the institutions who own the materials to have access
to the entire searchable database worldwide, thus
facilitating access to content which may be fragmentary
and/or held in several institutions to be viewed in one
and financial infrastructure of the TheoWeb project is even
more important. We
hope to find a model which will allow
itself to be self-funding, and able to fund its own growth
and any necessary administrative and technical costs;
to be able to support financially the creation of new
learning materials for the database, and to allow such
materials to be created, uploaded, and maintained as simply
institutions to make use of materials submitted by other
institutions, with quality control guaranteed through a
system of refereed vetting and professional editing of a
particularly high standard;
to locate a wide range of institutions able to offer them
value-added modules and programmes based on the learning
materials in the database;
to access materials at appropriate levels for their personal
learning or research needs.
the TheoWeb is intended as an online library of resources
designed for research,
teaching and learning in theology, it would provide the
informational building blocks for educational use.
To facilitate usage, it would make an open source
platform available to institutions and individuals to download
and use themselves, if they needed it.
TheoWeb would not run the modules, collect student fees,
give credits, or do any of the other administrative
responsibilities which rightly belong to the institutions
providing theological education. Rather, the institutions would
access the materials, tools and platform, but take
responsibility for creating the modules suitable for their own
programmes of study. If
an institution required technical support in the creation of
teaching materials using TheoWeb resources, that might be
supplied, but the infrastructure and support for the modules
created remain the responsibility of the institution.
TheoWeb, as a not for profit organisation, is committed
to providing an educational resource free to individuals and at
the lowest possible cost to participating institutions.
framework might include something like the following
institution might make use of both the database (with its
search tools) and the platform in order to create and offer
a module to students registered for courses leading to
certification and attracting a tuition fee; the fee for the
subscription would be set on a sliding scale related to the
fee income the module would attract.
institution might also make use of the resources provided to
create materials to supplement existing course provisions,
for example an interactive online website with materials in
addition to those provided in the face to face environment.
This use would be allowed under the subscription.
either case, TheoWeb would retain ownership and copyright
solely for electronic rights on the materials in the
database (in the form of ‘learning objects’ with their
associated metadata). Institutions
would retain ownership of the modules as constructed, and
individual writers contracted to provide learning objects
would retain other copyright (primarily to allow the writers
to publish print resources incorporating the information in
the learning objects if they desired to do so). It is not our desire to control nor to limit the other
uses of the intellectual property represented in the
might provide templates of modules created with TheoWeb
resources, so that other institutions might find ‘off the
peg’ modules to use in cases where they wish provide their
students a wider programme than they can manage; in that
case, the materials would be available through TheoWeb for
the usual fee, but a fee might also be payable to the
institution which created the module for any tutoring
support provided. We would expect that the syllabi of the modules be
provided without a fee, as is the case, for example, in the
AAR/SBL library of syllabi.
the database might be able to provide cross referenced
information regarding taught modules related to materials in
the database, so that students having located learning
materials according to their personal interests would be
able to find where modules appropriate to their needs might
funded by the fees mentioned above, would be able (as well
as paying for its own maintenance) to offer individual
consulting fees and institutional grants to develop online
possibilities like these and others are to be fostered, we will
need to develop structures to deal with quality-control,
copyright and other legal issues related to intellectual
property, cooperation between participating institutions,
international and intranational APL structures, long-term upkeep
of the materials, and so on.
name TheoWeb.org has been registered through Verisign.
Story: Part 1
I woke up one
morning in July (02) with the idea that there ought to be a way
to create reusable teaching materials in the form of learning
objects with a powerful search engine designed to create lessons
according to level, subject, aims, and so forth.
Colin Harrison of IBM had spoken to our Research Workshop
of their work with this technology and building databases, six
months or so before, and suddenly it all came together for me.
I made an
appointment to have lunch with William Richardson,
my line manager and soon to be head of school, and we
talked about the possibilities.
He was excited about the idea and encouraged me to go
ahead with it, and at the same time to attempt to find funding
for another project on theology and the web.
I began by
contacting friends in two theological colleges in Canada, asking
if they might be interested in participating in such a project,
and when they responded positively, I wrote a brief paragraph
explaining what I wanted to create, in order to attract other
potential partners or sponsors.
Soon I had a number of names of people and institutions
who were interested, and I began trying to build a network.
retrospect, I understand that there are at least three ways in
which people might be involved in the TheoWeb.
First are the Partners in the pilot project, institutions
with a need for materials and technology who would be able to
work to create the database and use it.
I wanted to have institutions in various parts of the
world, with different resources and challenges.
Beginning with my Canadian contacts, in Newfoundland and
in Saskatchewan, and then turning to Africa.
A Canadian friend from Toronto, now working in the US,
had spent a number of years teaching in Africa and is a
specialist on African New Testament scholarship.
Through him I was able to contact several African
institutions, and two more partners were added to the list.
At home, Exeter was the lead partner, with interest from
the local ordination training course which has been using the
online theology course we have developed.
Other UK institutions are not so far along in their
adoption of web-based training.
Having contacted all
of the institutions who provide theological education, I
discovered that none is as far along as we are, and that only
one other, the University of Durham, is nearing a commitment to
development. So we
began the autumn term with six or seven interested partners and
a brief description of the project.
relations between me and the Partners vary, depending on how
well I know the people involved.
The easiest contact was with the South West Ministry
Training Course, where I had taught for 5 years.
The principal, David Hewlett, was quite happy to be
included in the pilot, without feeling a need to have Council
approval at this stage. We
remain in touch because of the relationship he has with Theology
SW, the body that has funded my research for the past 18 months,
and so an informal ‘keep me posted’ attitude is possible.
However, he has just taken a new post, as principal of
Queen’s in Birmingham, and so a new relationship will have to
be forged with the new principal of SWMTC.
On the other hand, David’s role in Queen’s may well
mean that they are able to move in this direction sooner than
they otherwise might have done. I doubt that they will be Partners in the pilot project,
Canadian Partners grew out of long acquaintances.
My first contact was with Walter Deller in Saskatoon,
where he is head of one of the theological colleges.
I have known Walter in Toronto over a period of ten years
and worked with him while I was in the Diocese.
So, with that background I was able to email him a brief
description of what I was doing, a website address to look at
our online Bible course, and the offer for him to work with me
if they were interested.
He responded that they were very interested.
One of the problems facing heads of schools is that the
cost of putting up an internet course is Cdn $20-30000 (up to £12000),
and ‘at that rate duplicating (efforts) is craziness’.
included the names of several people doing distance education in
the cluster of colleges there.
Particularly, he suggested Bill Richards, a New Testament
scholar I had met when I was studying in Toronto, who has a
‘very good intro to early Christian literature up and
Bill Harrison, a systematician, has a course on Dorothy Sayers
with email interaction with the students, and Beth Marie Murphy
is working on a liturgy module.
Walter’s concern was that with limited resources ‘we
need to set a limit to what we offer and tilt it more towards
pre-theology and very intro to theology studies,’ and he
commented that he was ‘not convinced that it is the ideal
long-term way to form effective theologians and leaders.’
afterwards (Nov. 1), I received an email from Bill Richards,
Walter’s designated contact person, saying that they had
discussed the draft I had sent Walter in detail with the
faculty. They are
‘definitely interested in participating, as it would help us
out with the “flexible learning” opportunities we are trying
to offer people on their way to joining us for the residential
part of our degree programmes.’
In addition to the modules Walter had mentioned, Bill
noted that there was also a course in Ethics, and one being
prepared in Old Testament. There will be a new Church History course, but it has not yet
been adapted for the web. They
feel a lack in offerings in OT and Church History most.
questioned the structure of the TheoWeb, as I had suggested a
board like that of an academic journal to do quality control,
and he wondered whether TheoWeb would hold copyright to the
learning objects. He
also wondered if the Canadian partners should be approaching
funding bodies there, particularly the Anglican Foundation.
Atlantic side of Canada, in Newfoundland, Boyd Morgan, a
personal friend of ours, has been Provost of Queen’s College
in St. John’s. This
college is a part of Memorial University.
Boyd responded to my email by saying that he was ‘very
interested in pursuing your ideas in distance education.’
For a number of reasons, particularly since we thought
that we might stop in Newfoundland during our trip to Toronto in
November, I phoned Boyd and we talked about the project.
He is quite happy to be a part of the project, but
Queen’s is in a certain state of flux at the moment, since
Boyd will be retiring in June and a new Provost/Dean will be
coming on board. The
search took place in November while we were in Canada, in fact.
Moreover, Boyd would like a new faculty member, arriving
from Wales in February, to be our contact person, and so we have
not yet had much information from them.
Like all the other partners, he was concerned about the
cost of the project to the college, and about how it could be
used, particularly to provide materials for local groups across
Newfoundland and Labrador.
Because of the distances and weather, Newfoundland has
better IT infrastructure in place, so while they are remote,
some problems of distance education using the web have already
been worked out.
I wanted to
include some African partners in the group, and since another
friend from Toronto days, Grant LeMarquand, is a specialist in
African NT scholarship and has lived and worked in Africa, I
contacted him for leads. Grant
responded (Aug 2) quickly with a list of people, including
Stephen Noll in Uganda, Esther Mombo in Kenya, Teresa Okure in
Nigeria, and Gerald West in South Africa.
He forwarded my letter and his own response to all of
these people, with the comment that he was ‘sure that all of
them would be interested in what you are doing.’
Grant is interested in the project himself and would be
happy to ‘chip in on the conversation.’
Of the four
people Grant mentioned, I received responses from two.
The first to respond, and immediately, was Esther Mombo,
the Academic Dean at St. Paul’s United Theological College in
Kenya, where Grant had taught. She simply said ‘I/we would like to participate in the
project: please send me information and what part you would want
us to play.’ In
November (Nov. 7) she followed up to say that she was sharing
the information with other colleagues, and again in December
(Dec. 16) she wrote to say that they were happy to proceed, with
Joseph Galgalo as a second contact.
response from Grant’s list was from Gerald West, who thought
TheoWeb sounded like ‘a very interesting proposal.’
He invited me to have a look at his institution’s
website and to ‘feel free to probe!’ And so I did. Gerald
himself is also a graduate of Sheffield University’s doctoral
programme, although several years before I came to the UK. I followed up (on Nov.2), and he responded (Nov. 4) with two
‘important concerns’. The
first was a lack of personnel ‘to gather and organise the kind
of resources we would like to see on TheoWeb.
We are not interested in Euro-American packages on their
own. Would there be funding available to contract someone to work
at our end on this?’ I
responded that TheoWeb is not a package, but is instead a
database with a search tool using open course and open source
ware to the extent that we can.
I also emphasised the importance for TheoWeb to have
materials from various contexts throughout the world, ‘so that
students and teachers have direct access to thinking and
teaching that differs from what they would ordinarily find.’
And I wanted to reassure him, and all our partners, that
‘we are not in the business of trying to close discussions
down, but rather in making it possible to open new dialogues in
ways that have not been possible before.’
I let him know that we were looking for funding that
would enable partner institutions to pay staff to develop the
database, and I asked him to designate someone in the
institution to be our contact.
second concern was the financial cost to the institution to use
the resource we create. They
‘have little prospect of being able to pay a regular fee; in
fact, our University would discourage us from entering into any
venture that looks like a fee-based distance learning
added the clarification that ‘Nationally, our government has
prohibited residential universities from getting into distance
learning. So the
only way we could envisage using this resource would be as a
supplement for our students to existing programmes.
This would be a useful resource, but we would not be able
to ask students to pay for it.’
slated to give a paper in Toronto, so we agreed to meet and talk
discovered our Sheffield connection at the annual dinner for
alumni, and we had a chance to talk during the reception which
he commented that seeing me and talking with me (face to face)
made the difference for him.
He could see that I was the kind of high energy person
needed to bring a project like this off.
Since he is (in my opinion) an even higher energy person
than I am, I took that as a very positive beginning.
We agreed to be in touch again after the Christmas
contacted Harold Attridge, the Dean of Yale Divinity School,
where I did my theological training, to ask if YDS might be
interested in being a partner.
I was particularly interested in having access to the
library and to the expertise of the library staff.
I had met Diane Goldenberg-Hart at the Society of
Biblical Literature annual meeting in 2001, and was very
impressed by her skill and interest in web-based learning
programmes. I was
not able to meet with Dean Attridge in Toronto, and Diane was
not there this year, so that remains a lead to follow up.
As it turns out, her post is funded externally and the
funding will end in Oct. 2003, so she is quite interested in
seeing what might happen with this project.
In an email message to me (Nov. 2), Dean Attridge
mentioned that there might be ‘complications in our
involvement in such a project since Yale is part of a
collaborative arrangement with Oxford and Stanford to develop
on-line teaching resources.’
He did, however, forward my letter to him to his library