LIBRARY AND E-LEARNING 2.0: RESPONDING TO THE NEW EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION AREA (EHEA) INTO AN DEEP ECONOMIC CRISIS

The new European Higher Education Area or EHEA was presented full of promises but in practice it was implemented not only without extra funding but also in a period of serious budget cuts. In order to create a new area, working with what we already have, it is necessary to reevaluate areas, resources and their functions. The moment has come to reunite our efforts by working together in multi-professional teams in order to “multiply” and not just “add”. The moment has arrived to be versatile, to search for a common language, to create networks and disseminate our capabilities. If we maintain the belief that the library is a temple of erudition and the teacher the only one capable of generating knowledge, this converts the student into a passive subject and the virtual campus into a repository of notes. In this aspect, the library of the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (BUCM) is evolving towards a new concept: Center for resources for learning and research or CRAI (Centro de Recursos para el Aprendizaje e Investigacion) which is a center for socialization which foments the educational use of new technologies (ITCs) as well as virtual learning environments and the Web 2.0 tools, to develop E-learning or B-learning, systems wherein together, everyone in a cooperative spirit are enabled to learn and to share in the Internet. It is unquestionable that the connection of information and technology is becoming closer and it is necessary to form interdisciplinary teams and arm our students with the capability to get information and computer proficiency (IC2 -informational competences and computer-). Our project tries to answer the final conclusion of the Toledo Declaration (2006): “Those professionals interested in the promotion of capability for informational competences should establish a network amongst themselves for the coordination and development of joint activities”. Our general objective is to shift activities in the classroom, and in that, correct the absence of student participation: To strengthen learning activities that require participation and stimulate occupational socialization of our students by the maximum educational use of web 2.0 free access tools: To try not to encourage the accumulation of notes, providing incentives to create their own topics by working in groups (in the Internet), using study guides (electronic portfolio): personalized virtual bookshelves with digital resources of multiple formats. Our aspiration is that the students would be aware of the library as a resource center for learning and research. An open center and agreeable where one could work alone or in groups. We present the results of the Education Innovation Project PIMCD 1/2010-11, associated with PCI AECID B/030048/10.