Creative Commons training efforts strengthen our mission to “empower individuals and communities around the world through technical, legal, and policy solutions that enable the sharing of education, culture, and science in the public interest.” In 2024, our Learning & Training team focused on: 1) piloting new partnerships, 2) expanding training options, and 3) reaching new communities.  We are pleased that our 2024 training and engagement efforts supported national governments, universities, secondary education institutions, NGOs, librarians, cultural heritage professionals, and web developers spanning almost every continent.  See below for highlights, and contact us if you would like to collaborate in 2025. 

• Piloting new partnerships:
  •  CC worked in partnership with the University of Nebraska at Omaha on “Introduction to Open Educational Resources,” our first professional development microcredential course. 
  • We partnered with Library Juice Academy to create an additional microcredential course launching in January 2025. Registration is currently open until all seats are filled. 
  • Similar to our partnership with the US Midwest Higher Education Compact (MHEC), we partnered with BCcampus to support subsidized CC Certificate training for additional higher education institutions. 
• Expanding training options: 
  • CC provided increased support for our CC Certificate program and its 1,892 alumni across 68 countries. The CC Certificate program trains advocates, educators, librarians, and cultural heritage professionals in copyright, open licensing and open practices for advocacy. This year, CC awarded 35 scholarships for Certificate courses; hosted 24 webinars covering topics such as Digitized Representation by Heritage Institutions, Accessible OER, AI, copyright, and CC licenses; and provided multiple avenues of engagement for Certificate alumni, including both formal and informal mentorship options and a monthly newsletter.
  • CC increased our customized training offerings, providing workshops, tutorials, talks and training for: the AAC&U’s Institute on OER, Africa Journals Online, CEU Press and Ukrainian Partners, California Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC) program grantees, CC Rwanda, the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History, Ghanaian secondary school educators focused on Open Education For Climate and Environmental Sustainability, ISTE Live 2024, the Missouri’s A&OER Conference pre-conference training day, OER and Social Justice for Affordable Learning Kentucky, Utrecht University, Wikimania, in partnership with Ukrainian and Netherlands librarians, a Willoughby Institute faculty workshop at Dickinson College, and a WordPress Campus Conference Lightning Talk. See additional engagements including keynotes and moderated discussions in our CC Open Education Year in Review.
• Reaching new communities:
  •  To reach more librarians, CC collaborated with the American Library Association to provide a 4-week webinar series for ALA’s Core division, supporting librarians’ professional development. CC also hosted presentations at ALA LibLearnX and ALA Annual. 
  • To reach more communities involved in Open Science and Open Data, CC hosted trainings including: an Open Climate Data Recommendations and CC Licensing 101 workshop for Open Education week, Open Data training for the California Department  of Transportation, an open data workshop for ocean and climate researchers in partnership with Intertidal Agency, the Michael J. Fox Foundation, and the Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications. 
  • CC provided training for additional government audiences with a CC 101 for the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

Reflecting on 2024, we are grateful for the friendships and collaborations forged, and the new communities we had the pleasure of meeting. As we continue working toward the three goals in 2025, we hope to connect! If you would like to partner with CC, host a CC training for your institution, or get CC support for your community of practice, please let us know. Learn more on our website and email learning [at] creativecommons.org for more information. We’d be delighted to help you continue to grow your knowledge expertise in opening access to research, science, education, and culture.