University teaching and learning is involving more and more video and audio. Video (the word “video,” as used here, embraces modern moving-image content and technology, and “audio” the same for recorded sound) is being deployed in the physical classroom to enrich the classroom experience. Video and audio are coming to populate online and distance learning experiences. Video and audio recordings are being made to distribute university lectures and university-based events for audiences well beyond the university campus. As the production and distribution of video and audio increases, the implications for open education initiatives grow more profound.

“Video, Education, and Open Content: Best Practices” is a two-day symposium intended to increase the understanding of educators, technologists, video producers, and other stakeholders in how video and open education can work together for the public good. Senior representatives are expected to participate from the BBC, British Universities Film and Video Council, Case Western University, Creative Commons, Columbia University, Digital Library Federation, Ford Foundation, Google/YouTube, Harvard University, Hewlett Foundation, IMLS, Intelligent Television, JISC, Library of Congress, Mellon Foundation, Michigan State University, Microsoft, MIT, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Science Foundation, NYU, One Laptop Per Child, Open Courseware Consortium, Renew Media, Rockefeller Foundation, UC Berkeley, USC, VFinity, WGBH, WNET, and Yale University, among others.

This symposium builds upon the work that the Columbia Center for New Media Teaching and Learning and Intelligent Television have been conducting in the area of educational video, open productions, and commercial-noncommercial collaborations, and will help define new approaches—economic, legal, and editorial—to the creation and distribution of important new resources for open education.