Difference between revisions of "Open Assessors' Network"

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{{encyclopedia|Open assessment}}
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[[Category:Open assessment]]
 
[[Category:Glossary term]]
 
[[Category:Glossary term]]
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{{encyclopedia|moderator=Jouni}}
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This page is about a mass collaboration project '''Open Assessors' Network'''. For a description about the project's website and workspace, see [[Opasnet]].
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<section begin=glossary />
 
<section begin=glossary />
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:The '''Open Assessors' Network''' ('''Opasnet''') is a [[:en:mass collaboration|mass collaboration]] project for [[open assessor]]s, that is people who are willing to promote the [[open assessment]] practices in the aim to improve societal decision-making. The major part of the collaboration happens on the website of this network: http://www.opasnet.org (to be opened soon, currently we use http://heande.pyrkilo.fi).
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:The '''Open Assessors' Network''' is a [[:en:mass_collaboration|mass collaboration]] project for [[Open assessor|open assessors]], that is people who are willing to promote the [[Open assessment|open assessment]] practices in the aim to improve societal decision-making. The major part of the collaboration happens on [[Opasnet]], the website and workspace of this network: http://en.opasnet.org. In addition, there is a plan that [[Open Assessors' Network]] should be developed into a registered society for people interested in [[open assessment]]; the current plan is called [[:fi:Avointen arvioijien yhdistys Avary|Avary]] (description in Finnish). The society could maintain the [[Opasnet]] website and publish the [[Journal of Open Assessment]].
 
<section end=glossary />
 
<section end=glossary />
  
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The '''Opasnet''' is based on the idea that assessments should no longer be done in closed expert groups that produce some static reports that may or may not answer the questions a decision-maker actually has, and that are only as credible as the expert group is. Instead, two improvements are needed. First, an assessment should be built on an explicit information need that is defined by an open deliberation between experts, decision-makers, and stakeholders. Second, everything in the assessment - including premises, data sources, modelling, and conclusions - is open to scientific criticism. To be able to perform such assessments in practice, several things must be available. The '''Opasnet''' aims to provide these things that are briefly described below (with links to more extensive pages).
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==Question==
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How should Open Assessors' Network function to fulfil it purpose to
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* help interested people in making open assessments,
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* help people in learning skills needed in open assessments,
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* help skilled people in teaching their skills to others,
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* promote the enthusiasm and recruit new members, and
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* build the capacity to mobilise enough people to work on a new case even within hours?
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==Answer==
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* Network is organised virtually using a [http://www.facebook.com/pages/Open-Assessors-Network/109330159394?sk=wall Facebook group].
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** Members can post questions, tasks, and challenges on the wall.
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* Members can develop new skills for making open assessments. For a description, see [[Opasnet user skills]].
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** Members can keep a record about their skills on a page User:Member/Skill. For description, see [[:op_fi:Aikakone|Aikakone]] (in Finnish).
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** Each skill must be verified and accepted by another member who already has that skill.
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** Some challenges and tasks (such as [[List of tasks for R experts]]) are only available to members with specific skills.
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* Tasks are pieces of work for which someone has promised to give compensation, such as money. At the moment, [[THL]] is the largest supplier of tasks that are paid for. There ares list of tasks from which anyone with enough skills can take a task and do it (after some administrative business). See [[List of open tasks]], [[:op_fi:Avoimia tehtäviä|Avoimia tehtäviä]] (in Finnish), and [[List of tasks for R experts]].
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* Challenges are like tasks but nobody has promised to pay for doing them. The motivation of doing challenges vary: they may be fun or challenging, or lead to social good. Also, social [[respect]] in the form of [[onor]]s may be given to people who succeed in challenges, although this is difficult to promise by anyone beforehand. In addition, there is a challenge of developing the actual system of distributing respect in the form of onors.
  
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:We need a '''common platform''' or workspace where all these interested people may meet and work together. In practice, the core of the system must be based on an Internet workspace, although all traditional methods of group work (such as stakeholder meetings) should still be used and are available. But the products from traditional methods should be incorporated into the core system so that everyone who were not in a meeting still can read about the conclusions. This wiki-based website works as the core platform for this [[:en:mass collaboration|mass collaboration]] effort.
 
  
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:We need a '''systematic information structure''' for all the parts of an assessment. A crucial problem currently is that the information useful for the assessment is sparsely located. The major task of performing the assessment is to collect the relevant pieces of information and synthesise them. Also, many stakeholder involvement projects have ended up to a failure, either because a large amount of feedback was so unstructured that there were not enough resources to make anything useful out of it, or because people guessed that this would happen and did not give any feedback in the first place. Therefore, the assessment must have a clear but flexible structure where the right location of ANY relevant piece of information can fairly easily be found. This way, it will become possible to save resources in organising information. Each contributor should himself or herself find the right location for his or her comment. Although it is extra work for the contributor, he or she can more easily see the importance of the contribution. One of our slogans is: "There is no such thing as a general comment."
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==Rationale==
  
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:The systematic information structure is performed using '''standardised information objects'''. The most important ones are called [[variable]]s (descriptions of real-world phenomena), [[assessment]]s (descriptions of the questions and conclusions of a particular policy need), and [[method]]s (descriptions of how to actually perform a work that is needed for an assessment). Importantly, an assessment consists of variables and the '''[[causality|causal connections]]''' between them.  
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The activities in Open Assessors' Network should be like a game: fun to do, socially attractive, and challenging so that step-by-step challenges that lead to more and more demanding tasks with higher and higher rewards.
  
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:We need a systematic way for [[discussion]] and '''[[dealing with disputes]]'''. For this, we use the approaches of [[:en:pragma-dialectics|pragma-dialectics]], a scientific theory of argumentation that looks at argumentation as a speech act. In this view, argumentation contains both the argumenting (act) and the argument (content). The argumentation is operationalised as Talk pages (see the 'discussion' tab on the top of each page) with some practical tools to help on-line discussions. Of course, other methods for discussion are allowed, but the main contents should be transformed into the core system after the discussion, so that others can see the results.
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==Tasks that open assessors should be able to do==
  
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:We need systematic methods for doing assessments. This can be a [[guidebook]] about how assessments are done in general, and [[method]]s about particular pieces of work. We are collecting work descriptions to this website (for examples, see a [[:category:Method|category for methods]]. We are also collecting software [[tool]]s for pieces of work that are either difficult to do without existing tools, or that repeat from one assessment to another in a very similar way, thus enabling standardisation of the work. For examples, see a [[:Category:Tool|tool category]] and [[:category:Analytica tool|a category for Analytica tools]].
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:''Main article: [[Opasnet user skills]].
  
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:We need an information source that contains results from previous assessments. This information can then be utilised in other assessments either as such, or after adjustments for new situations. In any case, the more information assessors provide for others, the easier it will become to perform new assessments. The information can be either [[:category:assessment models|assessment models]], or [[result database|model results]]. Both types of information is provided on this website.
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==See also==
  
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Preliminary versions of all of these methods, websites, tools, and information sources already exist on this website, and they are available to anyone. The '''Open Assessors' Network''' invites you to participate in making assessments and improving the system for the benefit of future decision-making and the future world.
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* [[Opasnet user skills]]
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* [[Opasnet]]
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* [[Open assessment]]
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* [[Journal of Open Assessment]]
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* [[Open assessor]]
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* [[:op_fi:Wikipuolue|Wikipuolue]] (in Finnish)

Latest revision as of 04:27, 12 January 2012


This page is about a mass collaboration project Open Assessors' Network. For a description about the project's website and workspace, see Opasnet.

<section begin=glossary />

The Open Assessors' Network is a mass collaboration project for open assessors, that is people who are willing to promote the open assessment practices in the aim to improve societal decision-making. The major part of the collaboration happens on Opasnet, the website and workspace of this network: http://en.opasnet.org. In addition, there is a plan that Open Assessors' Network should be developed into a registered society for people interested in open assessment; the current plan is called Avary (description in Finnish). The society could maintain the Opasnet website and publish the Journal of Open Assessment.

<section end=glossary />

Question

How should Open Assessors' Network function to fulfil it purpose to

  • help interested people in making open assessments,
  • help people in learning skills needed in open assessments,
  • help skilled people in teaching their skills to others,
  • promote the enthusiasm and recruit new members, and
  • build the capacity to mobilise enough people to work on a new case even within hours?

Answer

  • Network is organised virtually using a Facebook group.
    • Members can post questions, tasks, and challenges on the wall.
  • Members can develop new skills for making open assessments. For a description, see Opasnet user skills.
    • Members can keep a record about their skills on a page User:Member/Skill. For description, see Aikakone (in Finnish).
    • Each skill must be verified and accepted by another member who already has that skill.
    • Some challenges and tasks (such as List of tasks for R experts) are only available to members with specific skills.
  • Tasks are pieces of work for which someone has promised to give compensation, such as money. At the moment, THL is the largest supplier of tasks that are paid for. There ares list of tasks from which anyone with enough skills can take a task and do it (after some administrative business). See List of open tasks, Avoimia tehtäviä (in Finnish), and List of tasks for R experts.
  • Challenges are like tasks but nobody has promised to pay for doing them. The motivation of doing challenges vary: they may be fun or challenging, or lead to social good. Also, social respect in the form of onors may be given to people who succeed in challenges, although this is difficult to promise by anyone beforehand. In addition, there is a challenge of developing the actual system of distributing respect in the form of onors.


Rationale

The activities in Open Assessors' Network should be like a game: fun to do, socially attractive, and challenging so that step-by-step challenges that lead to more and more demanding tasks with higher and higher rewards.

Tasks that open assessors should be able to do

Main article: Opasnet user skills.

See also

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