17.2 What is OER?

OER = Sharing instructional content & materials 

Open educational resources (OER) are openly-licensed, freely available educational materials that can be modified and redistributed by users. They can include any type of educational resource, from syllabi to full courses.

  • Openly-licensed: You can adapt, remix, redistribute
  • Freely Available: The resources must be freely available online with no fee to access. Physical OER may be sold at a low cost to facilitate printing.
  • Modifiable: The resource must be made available under an open license that allows for editing. Ideally, it should also be available in an editable format.

Check your Understanding

Consider the free materials you currently use in your classes. Do these materials meet the definition of OER? Why or why not?

 Benefits of using OER

 Faculty

Listen to faculty share their experiences integrating OER in the classroom (note: iLearn is like Canvas, our learning management system where we manage students, grading, and course content.)

Some highlights from the video:

  • Students can access instructional materials immediately
  • Affordable
  • Encourage students to use materials 
  • Digital tools allow for more autonomy for learning 
  • All content was integrated into the learning management system - one stop shop for students
  • Content is current and relevant 
  • Freeing from the structural elements of the textbook 

 Students

One of the first aspects of OER to be praised by the general public was the cost savings that they could bring to students. As Figure 1 shows, the price of college textbooks has risen greatly over the past 35 years, outpacing all other consumer goods in the Consumer Price Index by a great margin.

The cost of textbooks has a profound impact on college students, many of whom must wait to purchase their course materials until well into the semester or choose not to purchase them at all.

The cost of textbooks might not be a major issue on its own, but it can be an insurmountable hurdle for students already struggling to get by. As a recent survey found, 36% of college students are food insecure. This number is even higher for community college students, 42% of whom reported food insecurity.

The problem of food and housing insecurity among college students cannot be fixed by adjusting the price of textbooks alone. There are a wide variety of reasons why these problems are in place. However, the unexpected additional cost of textbooks can make the difference between a student persisting in college or dropping out.

Additional Resources/Works Cited 

  1. Bliss, T.J. and Smith, M. "A Brief History of Open Educational Resources." In Open: The Philosophy and Practices that are Revolutionizing Education and Science, edited by Rajiv Jhangiani and Robert Biswas-Diener, 9-27. London: Ubiquity Press, 2017. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/bbc.b. ↵ Links to an external site.
  2. Weller, Martin. The Battle for Open: How Openness Won and Why it Doesn't Feel Like Victory. London: Ubiquity Press, 2014. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/bam ↵ Links to an external site.
  3. Although all OER are openly licensed, many are released in formats that do not easily allow for adaptation. ↵ Links to an external site.
  4. William & Flora Hewlett Foundation. "Open Educational Resources." Accessed June 15, 2019. https://hewlett.org/strategy/open-educational-resources ↵ Links to an external site.
  5. Florida Virtual Campus. 2018 Student Textbook and Course Materials Survey: Executive Summary, 2018. Accessed June 15, 2019. https://www.flbog.edu/documents_meetings/0290_1174_8926_6.3.2%2003a_FLVC_SurveyEXSUM.pdf ↵ Links to an external site.
  6. Romo, Vanessa. "Hunger and Homelessness are Widespread Among College Students, Survey Finds." NPR: The Two-Way, April 2018. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/04/03/599197919/hunger-and-homelessness-are-widespread-among-college-students-study-finds ↵ Links to an external site.
  7. Goldrick-Rab, Sara and Cady, Clare. Supporting Community College Completion with a Culture of Caring: A Case Study of Amarillo College, 2018. https://hope4college.com/supporting-community-college-completion-with-a-culture-of-caring-a-case-study-of-amarillo-college/ Links to an external site. ↵ Links to an external site.
  8. Although OER are free for anyone to access, this access is still limited by who has access to the Internet. Still, since OER can be freely redistributed, some individuals have printed OER for dissemination in areas that do not have Internet access as well. ↵ Links to an external site.
  9. Hodgkinson-Williams, Cheryl and Arinto, Patricia B. Adoption and Impact of OER in the Global South. Cape Town & Ottawa: African Minds, International Development Research Centre & Research on Open Educational Resources, 2017. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.1005330 ↵ Links to an external site.
  10. Attribution: The Benefits for Instructors section of this chapter was adapted from the SUNY OER Community Course Links to an external site., licensed CC BY 4.0. Links to an external site. ↵ Links to an external site.
  11. Open textbooks have not always been the most common content shared or marketed as OER. One of the first OER projects, MIT OpenCourseWare, started offering lecture notes, syllabi, and other instructional content openly in 2001. ↵ Links to an external site.