Leading providers of online educational resources in the United States and Australia announce cooperative agreement

Leading providers of online educational resources in the United States and Australia announce cooperative agreementFebruary 16, 2001

The Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM) Project (www.geminfo.org) and education.au limited, managers of the Education Network Australia (EdNA Online–www.edna.edu.au/EdNA), have made a cooperative agreement to share quality online educational resources between the two countries and to improve methods of organizing and cataloging these resources. The agreement enables researchers from GEM and EdNA to collaborate on efforts designed to further the development of online educational resources, in particular projects that relate to metadata and taxonomy services. Sharing of GEM and EdNA metadata will also enable interoperability testing between the two projects. The agreement is part of both GEM and EdNA’s ongoing, wide-ranging efforts to ensure that educators have access to the substantial collections of educational materials that are available on various federal, state, university, nonprofit and commercial Internet sites. “The partnership between EdNA and GEM is essential for creating a seamless network of education information,” says R. David Lankes, director of the Information Institute of Syracuse, which houses the GEM Project. Lankes is also an assistant professor in Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies. “We view this relationship as essential, reaching across the world to improve teaching and learning,” Lankes says. “The entire GEM team is thrilled.” Gerry White, CEO of education.au limited, says that “the close working relationship developed between GEM and EdNA heralds a new era of global cooperation in education. This will benefit all those who access digital resources–including teachers, students, lecturers and parents–by significantly expanding the number of quality educational resources available through our Web sites.”

EdNA Online, Australia’s national education and training gateway, is managed by education.au limited on behalf of all Australian governments and the Australian education and training community. It provides access to 325,000 indexed items derived from 11,000 evaluated educational resources. GEM is recognized as a national leader in the United States in providing educators with access to thousands of online resources through its Web site (www.thegateway.org). The Gateway to Educational Materials has more than 15,000 educational resources catalogued on the Web site. GEM, which is funded by the U.S. Department of Education, is a special project of the ERIC Clearinghouse on Information and Technology, and is affiliated with SU’s School of Information Studies. Education officials in both the United States and Australia have indicated a willingness to make available comprehensive listings of quality education and training resources, and have cooperated with the GEM Projects’ initiatives.