The aim of the OSR project was the creation of a shared repository of scientific digital objects - currently dispersed in European science museums and science centres –in order to make them more widely and coherently available, searchable and usable in the context of formal and informal learning situations.

• A highly accessible portal, organised with state of the art technology and equipped with excellent searching tools.
• Providing an easy and attractive interface to access the repository.
• Enabling users to view the finest digital collections in European science centres and museums, follow attractive educational pathways connecting the objects with well-defined semantic metadata and even enrich the content provided with social tags of their own choice.
• Easy access and function of tagging objects enhances user experience in connection with the museum and science centre and creates greater engagement.
• Tagging lets users assert their own connections and associations between objects and phenomena in ways that reflect personal perspectives and interests.

As a last step, the project will propose a roadmap towards a standardized Science Resources (re-)usability approach. This tool will include recommendations and guidelines for the design of Science Education Learning Content and Activities, on the appropriate metadata methods needed for their description in respect to both their educational and their domain-related characteristics.

Consortium

The consortium running the project includes a balanced mix of science museums and science centres, pedagogues, educational technologists, metadata experts, user groups and standardization bodies.
Ecsite, the European network for science centres and museums, based in Belgium, is the project coordinator.

The following organisations form the consortium:

• Bundesministerium fur Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur, Austria
• MENON Network, Belgium
• Elinogermaniki Agogi, Greece
• University of Bayreuth, Germany
• Lambrakis Foundation, Greece
• Deutches Museum, Germany
• Heureka, the Finnish science centre, Finland
• Evgenides Foundation, Greece
• National Museum of Science and Technology Leonardo Da Vinci, Italy
• Cité des sciences et de l'industrie, France
• Palace of Miracles, Hungary
• Pavilhao do Conhecimento - Ciencia Viva, Portugal
• INTRASOFT Intl., Luxembourg
• Växjö University, Sweden
• IKnowHow, Greece
• University of Jyväskylä, Finland
• Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education, USA
• University of Central Florida, USA
• The Science Education Center at National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan, RoC