Important Events in the History of Digital Higher Education

The blog post series Important Events in the History of Digital Higher Education was originally published on the website of the Digital Higher Education Consortium of Texas (DigiTex) and has now been compiled into a booklet for ease of use. In this series, you will find articles covering five pivotal moments in the history of digital higher education including the first "online" learning program at the Western Behavioral Sciences Institute, the Andrew Project at Carnegie Mellon University, Project Athena at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Glenn Jones' Mind Extension University, and CALCampus, one of the first resources for online synchronous learning.

Material Type: Reading

Author: Heather Walker

Linn Benton Community College's General Science 106, Earth Science Companion Website

This website was designed to replace a traditional textbook in a 100-level General Science/Earth Science class. Open Educational Resources are listed to for each subject and accompanying homework assignments are based on assigned readings. Learning Objectives and Additional Useful Resources are also listed for each subject. Login with a Google account is required to access this document and enable instructors to track student responses.

Material Type: Homework/Assignment, Reading

Author: Michelle Harris

Module 10: Final Assessment

Thank you for taking the time to complete this professional development! We understand that learning about OER and applying open licensing concepts to adapt or create your own work is an incremental process. Please come back to these modules to review at any time. We will keep the links and Texas-related information updated. To receive a certificate of completion for these modules, please complete and submit the final assessment linked below.

Material Type: Assessment, Module

Author: Carrie Gits

Module 1: Introduction to This Course

By the end of this course, you should be able to: -Define Open Educational Resources -Explain the rationale for OER adoption and use -Explain the differences between the six currently available Creative Commons licenses -Identify repositories and other resources for finding relevant OER -Use tools and criteria to evaluate OER -Recognize steps and associated criteria for adapting and creating OER with proper attribution and licensing -Create an open educational resource -Review the current landscape of OER in Texas Higher Education -Recognize different Texas legislation on OER

Material Type: Module

Author: Carrie Gits

Module 2: Understanding OER

The nonprofit organization Creative Commons provides the following definition of open educational resources (OER): “Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research materials that are either (a) in the public domain or (b) licensed in a manner that provides everyone with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5R activities.” In Texas, Senate Bill 810 (SB 810), which was signed into law in June 2017, further defines OER as follows: “‘Open educational resource’ means a teaching, learning, or research resource that is in the public domain or has been released under an intellectual property license that permits the free use, adaptation, and redistribution of the resource by any person. The term may include full course curricula, course materials, modules, textbooks, media, assessments, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques, whether digital or otherwise, used to support access to knowledge.” The key distinguishing factor of this type of educational resource is the copyright status of the material. If course content is under a traditional, all-rights-reserved copyright, then it’s not an OER. If it resides in the public domain or has been licensed for adaptation and distribution, then it is an OER.

Material Type: Module

Authors: Carrie Gits, Judith Sebesta

Module 3: Open License

A license is a document that specifies what can and cannot be done with a work. It grants permissions and states restrictions. Broadly speaking, an open license is one that grants permission to access, re-use and redistribute a work with few or no restrictions (definition from Openedefinition.org).

Material Type: Reading

Module 3: Why OER?

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.

Material Type: Module

Author: Carrie Gits

Module 4: Creative Commons Licenses

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.

Material Type: Lesson, Reading

Module 5: Finding & Evaluating OER

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.

Material Type: Module

Author: Carrie Gits

Module 9: A Look at OER in Texas

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.

Material Type: Module

Author: Carrie Gits

Module 9: Why OER Matters

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.

Material Type: Module

OER: A Field Guide for Academic Librarians

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.

Material Type: Textbook

Authors: Andrew Wesolek, Anne Langley, Jonathan Lashley

OER: A Field Guide for Academic Librarians (Editor's Cut)

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.

Material Type: Case Study, Teaching/Learning Strategy

Authors: Andrew Wesolek, Anne Langley, Jonathan Lashley

OER Core Elements Academy Fall 2021 Resources

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.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Megan Simmons, Michelle Singh, Kylah Torre

OER Core Elements Academy June 2021 Resources

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.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Megan Simmons, Kylah Torre, Michelle Singh

OER Playbook: Making the Case for 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.

Material Type: Reading

Author: Lumen Learning

OER Rubrics | Achieve.org

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.

Material Type: Assessment, Teaching/Learning Strategy

Author: Achieve

OER Synthesis and Evaluation/Evaluation Toolkit

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

Material Type: Interactive

Author: Lou McGil

An Open Companion to Early British Literature

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.

Material Type: Lesson Plan, Textbook

Author: Allegra Villarreal

Open Education Licensing Project

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.

Material Type: Interactive