Before we discuss the benefits of OER in detail, please take a few minutes to watch this video from Abbey Elder, Open Access & Scholarly Communications Librarian at Iowa State University. The video reviews the definition of OER but also provides a broad overview of why OER is an effective solution in addressing student barriers to high-quality learning materials. The video also provides examples of how faculty can use OER to enhance their teaching and improve student learning.

In previous modules we had a chance to discuss the background of open licenses and what they are. We learned that Creative Commons (CC) is the most widely used open license for open educational resources. In this module, we will discuss CC licenses– what they are, to what they pertain, and how to mark our works with them.

Modules 1-4 provided you with a solid introduction to various aspects of open educational resources such as the benefits to using OER, the 5R Framework, and open licensing. In this module, you will apply what you now know about OER and start finding the variety of open resources available to you. Through this module, you will be exposed to a variety of search strategies used in locating and finding relevant OER, and you will explore some of the more useful online repositories and sites which host OER. This module will also focus on elements of evaluating OER.

This module will provide a broad overview of OER across the state. This includes discussion of the results of a recent landscape survey by DigiTex, a snapshot look at recent Texas legislation related to OER, and a variety of examples from colleges and universities who are offering OER Degree pathways and OER courses across their curriculum.

Why do open educational resources matter? What is the point of using OER? Below are some of the benefits of using open educational resources that I have seen while working with OER over the past several years.

We intend this book to act as a guide writ large for would-be champions of OER, that anyone—called to action by the example set by our chapter authors—might serve as guides themselves. The following chapters tap into the deep experience of practitioners who represent a meaningful cross section of higher education institutions in North America. It is our hope that the examples and discussions presented by our authors will facilitate connections among practitioners, foster the development of best practices for OER adoption and creation, and more importantly, lay a foundation for novel, educational excellence.

We intend this book to act as a guide writ large for would-be champions of OER, that anyone—called to action by the example set by our chapter authors—might serve as guides themselves. The following chapters tap into the deep experience of practitioners who represent a meaningful cross section of higher education institutions in North America. It is our hope that the examples and discussions presented by our authors will facilitate connections among practitioners, foster the development of best practices for OER adoption and creation, and more importantly, lay a foundation for novel, educational excellence.

This resource includes the recordings and practice activities for the OER Core Elements Academy which consists of three synchronous, virtual sessions:Introduction to Open Educational Resources & Practices - Exploration of the what, why, and how of OER, highlighting use cases involving successful adoption and implementation of OER at Texas institutions.Discovery, Evaluation & Curation - Hands-on training aimed at supporting effective search, quality evaluation, and curation strategies to collaboratively identify, evaluate, and organize OER relevant to desired use.Authoring & Remixing - Deep dive into courseware improvement, developing collaborative workflows to utilize authoring tools to design, create and remix resources. Leverage supports for peer-review, reflection, and refinement of resources.Participants will have assignments to complete between synchronous sessions. Two opportunities for office hours with OER experts will also be offered:Office Hours – Option for informal discussion with OER experts.Participants are required to attend 4.5 hours of instruction and complete approximately 7 hours of practice activities to find, curate, publish, and share OER.

This resource includes the recordings and practice activities for the OER Core Elements Academy which consists of three synchronous, virtual sessions:June 2: Introduction to Open Educational Resources & Practices - Exploration of the what, why, and how of OER, highlighting use cases involving successful adoption and implementation of OER at Texas institutions.June 16: Discovery, Evaluation & Curation - Hands-on training aimed at supporting effective search, quality evaluation, and curation strategies to collaboratively identify, evaluate, and organize OER relevant to desired use.June 30: Authoring & Remixing - Deep dive into courseware improvement, developing collaborative workflows to utilize authoring tools to design, create and remix resources. Leverage supports for peer-review, reflection, and refinement of resources.Participants will have assignments to complete between synchronous sessions. Two opportunities for office hours with OER experts will also be offered:June 9 and June 23: Office Hours – Option for informal discussion with OER experts.Participants are required to attend 4.5 hours of instruction and complete approximately 7 hours of practice activities to find, curate, publish, and share OER.

Making the Case for OER

Use the plays to build a network of supporters who will advocate for the change you want to make.

Open Educational Resources (OER) offer opportunities for increasing equity and access to high-quality K–12 education. Many state education agencies now have offices devoted to identifying and using OERs and other digital resources in their states. To help states, districts, teachers, and other users determine the degree of alignment of OERs to the Common Core State Standards, and to determine aspects of quality of OERs, Achieve has developed eight rubrics in collaboration with leaders from the OER community.

The toolkit is made up of three elements:
1). information and resources to support your evaluation activities
2). an interactive tool to guide you through our Evaluation and Synthesis framework, providing an opportunity to submit findings, observations and links to evidence AND which feeds this back to you for inclusion in your project reporting mechanisms
3). examples of evaluation materials, instruments and reports from other UKOER projects

This digital textbook was developed through an "open pedagogy" approach with over 100 Austin Community College students contributing footnotes, introductory chapters, digital learning objects, and test bank questions with a student audience in mind. 86 chapters cover 1,000 years of British literature featuring primary source texts commonly assigned for survey courses of British Literature (ENGL 2322). Additionally, assignments and student samples of work are included to help teachers interested in adopting the practices that led to its creation.

The OEL Toolkit is openly available and openly licensed. The guidance generated by the OEL Toolkit is of primary relevance to educators and developers working within Australian higher education institutions. The OEL Toolkit web application has been designed with a focus on ease of use. It provides relevant information for users seeking guidance on using, creating, modifying or sharing a specific Open Educational Resource.

This course is a guide for creating a self-paced community of learning-style curriculum for understanding the basics of Open Educational Resources (OERs). Originally developed in Canvas, this guide includes five learning modules with reflection questions, optional live discussion topics, and quizzes.  The purpose of this OER Community of Learning curriculum is to establish a campus-wide baseline knowledge on the subject of OERs.

This report is based on an independent survey commissioned in 2019 by the Digital Higher Education
Consortium of Texas (DigiTex), in collaboration with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB),
and the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME).

The Open Educational Resources (OER) in Texas Statewide Playbook is a resource developed by practitioners and advocates actively involved in the labor of open education to guide new and expanding OER work at institutions of higher education. The Playbook is the result of partnerships between the Division of Digital Learning, the Institution for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME) – creators of OER Commons and experts in open education practice and research – and faculty, librarians, staff, and administrators from institutions and systems across Texas. It aims to support institutions as they work to build capacity and drive systems change around OER. It also serves as a guiding document for institutions that have not yet engaged in OER work or taken advantage of existing programs and opportunities. The hope is that the Texas OER Playbook will serve as a companion on the journey towards OER awareness and advocacy at your institution.

A US history ancillary/textbook that examines some traditional some non-traditional aspects of American social, cultural, gender, racial, political, and military history. Most chapters include content provided by community college students.

Pressbooks is an Open Textbook platform. This Open (Canvas LMS) course demonstrates various methods of placing an open Pressbooks textbook in Canvas, including as a Navigation menu item and as links, PDFs or pages within Modules. It also includes various methods of providing students with a print version.