From Bilan Jama (CC USA)  | Volume 123 | February 19, 2021

THE OER DIGEST

Your bi-weekly newsletter for open education updates, opportunities, and reminders

OPEN EDUCATION WEEK: Open Education Week is a little over a week away! Organized by Open Education Global and held from March 1-7, institutions, organizations and individuals from around the world committed to the ideals of Open Education are welcome to join and contribute. Participation is free, and there are many different ways to engage. Check out the OE Week page for more info and register your local event, and be sure to browse their library of OE Week resources that have been compiled over the years. We hope to (virtually) see you there! 

CODE OF BEST PRACTICES: The Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Open Educational Resources was released this week. This document is intended to support authors, teachers, professors, librarians, and all open educators in evaluating when and how they can incorporate third party copyright materials into Open Educational Resources to meet their pedagogical goals. The Best Practices is built on a series of workshops, interviews, and webinars that were conducted over the course of 2019 and 2020.

UMBC OER SURVEY: In a survey of more than 900 students from fall 2020 who completed courses that utilized OER, The University of Maryland, Baltimore County College (UMBC) students said they appreciated saving money on instructional materials and would recommend an OER course to others. Nearly 90% of students said the quality of the OER course materials was of similar or higher quality than non-OER course materials. In the surveyed courses, faculty replaced traditional print textbooks with OERs and provided supplemental digital homework tools. 45% of students who completed the survey said they would be fairly likely or very likely to enroll in an OER course again, while 53% said they would recommend an OER course to others.

 

OPEN CONNECTIONS

Conferences, jobs, and other OER-related opportunities

JOB OPPORTUNITY: Touro College Libraries is seeking an Open Educational Resources & Instruction Librarian. The job posting is available here.

REGISTER NOW: The NC Department of Public Instruction and its GoOpenNC platform are facilitating a Culturally Relevant Teaching (CRT) Intensive that engages educators on a cultural and identity reflection with direct application to curriculum resources. The deadline to register is February 24, 2021. 

REGISTER NOW: Registration is now open for the collaborative UnConference led by North Carolina and Virginia to celebrate the 10th annual 2021 Digital Learning Day on February 25, 2021. Register here. 

WEBINAR SERIES:  Join CCCOER for their 2021 Webinar Series held Wednesdays at noon PT/3 pm ET. View sessions and register here. 

WEBINAR: UMBC is hosting a webinar on How to Get Started with Open Educational Resources from 12:00-1:00pm ET, March 3, 2021. The webinar will highlight two student-centered models for textbook procurement. Learn more and register here. 

REGISTER NOW: Registration is now open for the 2021 M.O.S.T. State Summit, which will take place virtually April 8-9, 2021. The theme of the 2021 conference is Using OER to Advance Equity and Inclusion. Learn more and register here. 

 

STORIES FROM THE FIELD

Quick snapshots of those making change on the ground level, and those impacted

 

FROM CALIFORNIA: Hancock College and three other community colleges in California will be able to provide free textbooks and materials to students after receiving a $1.9 million U.S. Department of Education grant. Under the terms of the grant, Hancock, West Hills Community Lemoore, the College of Marin and College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita will form the California Consortium for Equitable Change in Hispanic Serving Institutions Open Education Resources, or CC-ECHO, program. “The cost of textbooks and other course materials continues to be a barrier for many students,” Hancock Superintendent and President Kevin G. Walthers said. “This grant will help remove those barriers and ensure that all of our students have equitable access to the quality education that Hancock provides.” Read more >>

FROM NEW JERSEY: Middlesex College is the statewide lead for a $1.44 million federal Department of Education OER grant. The three-year grant will engage a consortium of New Jersey community colleges and Rowan University to develop open textbooks in career and technical education STEM (science, engineering, technology, math) courses that align to career pathways in New Jersey’s growth industries including health services, technology, energy, and global manufacturing and supply chain management. “We know that the cost of textbooks can be a barrier for students as they pursue a degree,” Marilyn N. Ochoa, the college’s library director who led the effort in securing the grant, said in a prepared statement. “The grant is intended to help students in vocational and career education programs by reducing the cost of course materials and improving student learning outcomes.” Read more >>

FROM TEXAS: Architecture assistant professor Atefe Makhmalbaf is developing OER  for courses in building information modeling, which will finish the development stage by June or July and give students access to free course materials. Her project is called, “Development, Adoption, and Assessment of OER to Enhance Building Information Modeling Courses,” began after Makhmalbaf received a UTA CARES Innovation grant last spring. This platform will allow students to access materials before lectures and spend more class time on projects. “For building information modeling, there was absolutely no other similar resource freely available to students and in an organized coherent way that students can access and learn from,” Makhmalbaf said.  Read more >>

HOT OFF THE PRESS

Each edition, we highlight an interesting, new, openly-licensed resource

Virginia Tech Publishing and the Pamplin College of Business have released the Fundamentals of Business, third edition. The third edition includes data updates, graphic redesign over 70 figures, updated content to reflect changes in technology, law, and economics, and inclusion of company examples more familiar to today’s students. The book includes images of people that are more representative of a diverse student body.

Virginia Tech Publishing and the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) will publish Introduction to Biosystems Engineering, an open textbook for university-level introductory courses in biosystems engineering. Written by an international team of authors, this is the first open textbook published as part of the University Libraries’ membership in the Open Education Network Publishing Cooperative. 

WEIGH IN

Great reads to repost or share and interesting discussions to consider

 Great to Share >> 

Theology Department Receives $25,000 Grant To Lead “La Biblia” Workshops | The Rattler

 

Interesting to Consider >> 

Opinion: California’s universities should back open textbooks | The San Diego Union-Tribune 

Accessibility in open educational resources is resilience | OER & Beyond

 

Have suggestions for the next edition? Let us know at oerdigest@gmail.com, or tweet us @OERdigest.

 

The OER Digest is a public newsletter distributed to a broad group of stakeholders across the higher education community. Subscribe here.