Glasgow and Edinburgh Visits

Our partner visits started with the vet schools at Glasgow and Edinburgh and we received a very warm welcome and were truly inspired by the enthusiasm of all the staff members who came to meet us. As these were the first of the visits we weren't entirely sure what to expect and what form the meetings would take. Previously we had come up with an agenda with some key points that we wanted to cover and get peoples opinions on. These acted as points of discussion, leading to other very valuable suggestions and ideas from the partners. At each school our aim was to identify some potential resources for the museum and we were very impressed by the quality of what we saw, some of which had even been created by students.

OVAM Visits

Over the past week we have been busy organising visits to the schools which are collaborating for the project.

The currently agreed visits are going to take place on the following dates:
2nd February - Glasgow
3rd February - Edinburgh
6th February - Cambridge
7th February - Nottingham
8th February - Hartpury College
9th February - Bristol
10th February - RVC, London

Whilst visiting we hope to get a good idea of the resources which each school may be able to contribute. It would be excellent if we could meet with a student who is interested in acting as the student curator for the school too.
The student curators together with the contact for each institution will be tasked with helping to review the resources and select the most appropriate ones, using a set of criteria such as the media type, licensing, species, system, description and value for education as well as taking factors such as the quality and originality of the resource into account.

OVAM Progress

With the start of 2012 now upon us the OVAM project is now in full swing. The project team met last week to discuss and organise some of the finer details of the project, such as some ideas for the possible museum interface, how it is going to be linked to WikiVet, the types of resources which will be appropriate and possible ways they could be categorised as well as issues which may be encountered such as licensing and ethical concerns.

The next step is arranging all the visits to the UK schools, which we are aiming to try and fit in at the beginning of February. The idea of these visits is to meet with the anatomists and see and identify which resources that partners have which may be appropriate. We would also like to try and meet with a student who has a special interest in anatomy and could act as the student curator for the school. The student will then be responsible for checking material and selecting the resources which fulfill a set of criteria which make them appropriate for use in the museum and be invited to attend a workshop further into the project along with the student curators from other schools.

OVAM Launch Event Recording

We now have the Adobe Connect recordings of the launch event. They are split into three sessions to reflect the agenda.

Morning session 1 - OVAL Dissemination - find out more about the OVAL project

Morning session 2 - OVAM Launch part 1
Afternoon session - OVAM Launch part 2

The whole day is covered so the recording are quite long but you may find it useful to view if you are interested but were not able to come.

OVAM Project Launch Event

The OVAM launch event took place at the Royal Veterinary College, Hawkshead Campus on Friday 9th December and was well attended by over 30 people representing different partners and other interested organisations and institutions. Many important aspects of the project were discussed, with useful contributions and thoughts put forward by the attendees, including discussions on the following topics:

- which species should be the main focus, and how much comparative anatomy should be included

- whether there should be a historical aspect to the museum,

- the main audience the museum should target,

- ethical concerns about certain content being open

- the technical limitations for the project within the timeframe and the type of interface that will be possible

There were also attendees via adobeconnect from across the world including Scotland, Germany and Australia. The days events were recorded and videoed and will shortly be available to view for those who could not attend in person.

Project Launch

The Online Veterinary Anatomy Museum (OVAM) project was recently awarded funding by JISC. The official start of the project was the 1st November 2011 and it will run for 12 months.

The project will aim to provide access to veterinary anatomical resources in the form of a virtual museum. All UK vet schools are partners in the project as well as other European vet schools and commercial partners. The museum will be hosted within the WikiVet platform.

OVAM will provide access to a comprehensive and pedagogically structured set of veterinary anatomical resources from UK veterinary schools and other institutions. These will be aggregated and ordered in an environment which will make them easily discoverable by different cohorts of learners. Key to the success of this project will be the development of effective methodologies to embed and integrate these materials within a traditional curriculum to maximise exposure, uptake and sustainability.

For more information please see the OVAM Project Proposal Summary.

If you would be interested in collaboration with us, please do not hesitate to get in touch with Bara or Gemma

The opening event for OVAM will be on the 9th December 2011 at the Royal Veterinary College's Hawkshead Campus. For more information please see the agenda. If you would like to attend please email Bara, places are limited.