Got a big idea? Moz + Shuttleworth fellowship

Today Mozilla Drumbeat and the Shuttleworth Foundation are announcing a joint fellowship focused on ‘education for the open web’. Our aim is to find someone with solid, scalable and fresh ideas on how open learning and the open web intertwine. Once we find this person, we will back them with a year’s salary, project funding and all the connections, horn-tooting, coaching and love that we can muster.

We’ve posted the call for proposals on the Shuttleworth Foundation and Mozilla.org. The gist of what we’re looking for is:

We invite applications from individuals interested in using innovative approaches to teaching and learning to promote the open web.

The applicant should have one or more practical ideas that involve *making things* that will allow large numbers of people to learn about, improve and promote the open nature of the internet. The fellowship is not an academic fellowship aimed at research.

Ideas can connect the open web with learners of any age: opening up the world of web citizenship to kids; encouraging highschool students learn from the bendable and hackable world of the the web; helping people in their 20s learn the skills they need to create wealth or find work in the web era. Any of this would be a fit.

Also, ideas need not focus on formal learning within the education system. In fact, informal learning approaches that draw on the fluid nature of the web are highly encouraged. The main thing is that ideas need to have the potential for large scale participation and impact. Can you imagine your idea reaching thousands of people? Hundreds of thousands? Millions?

While these projects should *use* open technology and open source-style participation, they should not be primarily about software development.

The fellowship is open to anyone currently living in We are giving preference to proposals coming from Europe or Brasil, two key geographies for Mozilla’s Drumbeat initiative. However we recognize that good ideas can come from anywhere.

The deadline for submissions is June 7, 2010. We will interview the top five candidates in late June 2010.

Comments

  1. Suresh Damodaran replied on | Reply

    Dear Sir,
    This is a wonderful initiative. Open education thorough innovative delivery mechanisms are the future. Today we recreate the learning and teaching wheel in each and every educational institute. To make a great impact on the learners mind, the content should reach the person in 3 or 4 senses (Visual, Auditory, Speak, Touch and Experience). Should the learning be boring and with out life? Not necessarily, A musical way of learning is the NEW FUTURE. All the presentations would accompany music to greater memory and recall. The following steps would invite lot of open forum members.
    1. Make a presentation and share it with open community (with Transcripts) – Done by purely technical people
    2. Create a story, event or behind it and deliver it – Done by script writers
    3. Digitise the presentation with the great performers – Done by Actors/ Actresses
    4. Add music to the content – Done by music directors (Create a music templates as add-ons to a presentation)
    Eg – Think of Probability theory being available to students as a movie.
    For your views and comments.
    Thanks and Best Regards.
    Dr.Suresh Damodaran

  2. msurman replied on | Reply

    FYI, we’ve updated the call for proposals to be a bit more inclusive while still making it clear we’re hoping to find people in Brasil or Europe:

    “We will give preference to applications from people residing in Europe or Brasil, but we realize good ideas can come from anywhere.

    So, if you think your idea will knock our socks off, you can submit it no matter where you live. Also, there are other Drumbeat and Shuttleworth opportunities coming in future. So, useful to get your idea on radar even if you don’t win this fellowship.

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