Finding, Evaluating, and Advocating for OER
While reading What is OER, you were invited to imagine redesigning elements of an existing research project, course, or lesson to incorporate open educational resources in ways that suit your local context. Some of you might be considering materials such as datasets, lab experiments, simulations or discussion prompts. Others could be pondering videos, syllabi, slide presentations or assignments.
Still more might be thinking toward adopting, adapting, or re-mixing course design templates or course texts. You will find this chapter most helpful if you have something specific in mind. Skim the stakeholder section specific to your campus role for ideas.
Research, teaching and learning take place everywhere on campus. Definitely in the classroom, but we as a community are also exploring with and learning from each other on the sidewalk, in the union, waiting for elevators, and wandering through the library. The curation of healthy, meaningful research, teaching and learning environments engages the entire campus community. In this chapter, we will share (and invite!) ideas for how stakeholders other than faculty and instructors can help strengthen a healthy campus environment by supporting use of OER.
Many faculty already use OER in their classes — for example, showing an openly licensed course video or using worksheets created and shared by other faculty. Faculty can create and share syllabi, lesson plans, and even entire textbooks for their courses. They can collaborate with faculty at their own institutions, or other institutions around the world. They can access and remix existing OER and re-publish them to share with others.
If you are brand new to this idea, you might consider how you could customize a slide deck you have created to create a module students can experience that doesn’t lean on a commercial textbook.
If you have splashed in the OER pond a bit already, you might consider how you could adopt an existing textbook for use instead of requiring students to purchase a commercial textbook.
If you have looked at OER before but not found anything you loved, this is an excellent opportunity to explore how to take bits and pieces of several texts to remix as a bespoke resource for your course at your school.
Finding OER
There are many places to find openly licensed resources. I’d suggest you keep in mind the type of resource you need. If you are looking for something similar to a traditional textbook, I’d suggesting trying the Open Textbook Library, the Pressbooks Directory, or OpenStax. If you are looking for modules, assignments, or other elements you can integrate into your course try OER Commons or SkillsCommons. OASIS and MASON are also effective, but may be a bit overwhelming. Look around a bit, and once you have a sense of what you do or don’t like, contact your librarian and they will help you find what you need. You may find a little of what you need in several different resources. Because they are openly licensed you can pick and choose the parts that you like and put them together to create a contextualized resource that supports your course exactly the way you teach it.
Evaluating OER
You no doubt have your own ways of evaluating the quality and credibility of the information sources you are using. When you step into the OER world, you get to center your own expertise rather than depending on a brand or commercial publisher to tell you about the quality and credibility of a resource.
There are some faculty created resources that can help scope this evaluation. The OSU Speech Faculty have shared out the OER Review Checklist they use to evaluate resources. Theirs was adapted from one created by Affordable Learning Georgia. OER consultants from across the U.S. collaborated to create an OER Review Standards and Approval Rubric, and the OSRHE Online Consortium of Oklahoma has created a template useful to guide the search and a checklist to guide the evaluation of OER.
Advocating for OER
Centering faculty expertise and student success by moving toward OER can come with many leadership challenges. In your role as administrator, you are able to provide support and leadership through policy creation and strategic vision. But you also have to navigate the needs of an entire system, and it takes intentionality and energy to make changes to one part of the system without risking harm to another part of the system.
Your words matter, though, so even if you are not in a position to explicitly speak to the use of OER in policy or strategic vision documents, there are ways that you can show support to faculty actively responding to student concerns regarding the cost of textbooks by curating and creating open educational resources. You can lean into the OSRHE endorsement of OER use in the Blueprint 2030 to help support your advocacy, and point faculty toward the OSRHE/OCO OER funding to help faculty and instructors adopting and adapting OER. Even drafting a short note of thanks to be included in the materials shared with those engaged in this work would be meaningful. Two or three sentences of support from administration goes a long way. For instance, “I, President of The Best College/University, am thankful for the way my faculty and instructors have responded to student concerns by curating and creating open educational resources. These resources center the expertise of our faculty and scholars and exemplify the Best College/University code by increasing student access to learning experiences.”
Another option is to provide a short note of thanks to be included in the materials shared with those engaged in this work. The example letter below is a bit wordy, but you might find a few parts that would work for you.
Dear friends,
Welcome to Oklahoma State University! We are thankful to have you joining us and the Library is excited to partner with you to continue to support the Oklahoma State University community.
I am writing with a very specific request. Our faculty are actively responding to student concerns regarding the cost of textbooks by curating and creating open educational resources. In response to a Faculty Council Recommendation supporting the use and creation of open educational resources at OSU, the Library provides educational opportunities, instructional design and publishing assistance, and leads an OER Working Group which includes OSU students, faculty, instructors and staff. Since the 2019-2020 academic year our faculty saved students over $1,000,000.00 by using OER and library materials rather than requiring purchase of commercial textbooks. I would be thankful if you would be willing to provide a short note of thanks to be included in the materials we share with those engaged in this work. A bit more information about what we are doing is below.
Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials which faculty and instructors can provide at no additional cost to their students. Research indicates that OER can have a positive impact on student persistence and retention and time to degree. Faculty using OER are able to leverage their scholarly expertise in designing innovative experiences customized to reflect the needs and experiences of our community. The ability to customize teaching and learning resources which can eliminate requiring students to purchase commercial textbooks aligns with elements of our mission statement related to social justice, as you can see in the statement below.
Building on its land-grant heritage, Oklahoma State University promotes learning, advances knowledge, enriches lives, and stimulates economic development through teaching, research, extension, outreach and creative activities. The use of Open Educational Resources is a high impact strategy which can assist in addressing social justice issues. Because OSU is committed to access to knowledge creation across a diverse community, OSU supports the creation and use of OER.
Students are thankful to not have to purchase a textbook, and faculty are able to step confidently into the classroom knowing that all students had access to the resources before the first day of class even arrived. Our faculty are finding and creating resources that reflect our students and their communities. They are crafting instructional designs which can be modified to address and help give life to our student’s goals and provide the transformational Oklahoma State University experience our students trust they can expect. The Library has responded to the Faculty Council’s recommendation regarding OER and is positioned to assist with the creation and use of OER; a note from you would strengthen our ability to advocate for and support faculty in doing this important work. Thank you! ~Dr. Kathy Essmiller