The International Research Conference of the Open University of Sri Lanka (IRC-OUSL) is an important annual event of the Open University of Sri Lanka. This year IRC-OUSL 2024 was held on 07th and 08th November 2024 as a hybrid conference with the objective of bringing local and international researchers on a single platform.
The OUSL, which is the premier ODL institute in Sri Lanka. recognizes the importance of developing the potential of its academic staff by providing them with adequate opportunities to engage in research.
This year, we received 215 abstracts/extended abstracts and of which 153 abstracts were selected for presentation following a rigorous peer review process. The abstracts received cover a wide range of sub themes; ODL, Education, Quality Assurance for Higher Education, English Language Teaching, Engineering & Technology, Health Sciences, Biological Sciences, Physical Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Agriculture & Forestry, Humanities & Social Sciences, Management and Law.
The Chief Guest at the inauguration of IRC-OUSL 2024 was Senior Prof. P.M.C. Thilakarathne, the Vice-Chancellor of the OUSL. The invited speakers for the sessions included Prof. K. Kathiresan, Honorary Professor at Annamalai University, India, Prof. Samantha C. Karunarathna from Qujing Normal University, China, Prof. Kazunari Sei from Kitasato University, Japan and Prof. Janet H. Davis from Purdue University, USA.
The inaugural session recognized the outstanding achievements, by presenting the OUSL Research Awards 2023, OUSL Best Online Course Award 2023, OUSL Best Educational Video Production Award 2023, and the 3MT Competition Award.
Pre-conference webinars and workshops were organized on November 4th and 5th, 2024. Six faculties, PGIE, and CESSD contributed to organizing four webinars and five workshops, which were successfully completed.
Another highlight of this series of events are the six panel discussions, which were held parallel to the technical sessions. Across the technical sessions, 134 papers were presented onsite and 13 online. Both physical and online sessions were well attended, with active audience participation.
