OER Digest – February 28, 2025
Michael Basmajian (PIRG) | Volume 188 | February 28, 2025
THE OER DIGEST
Your monthly newsletter for open education updates, opportunities, and reminders
OPEN ED WEEK: Next week - March 3-7, 2025 - is Open Education Week! Be part of the global celebration and focus on open education. Learn how to register your own OEWeek events and share open assets/resources on the official OEWeek website - and join the conversation on social media with #OEWeek!
FEDERAL OER BILL: This week, a group of lawmakers led by Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) reintroduced the Affordable College Textbook Act in the U.S. Congress. The bill would establish a grant program for the creation and use of free, openly licensed textbooks, while also strengthening federal price disclosure requirements for textbook publishers and institutions. If passed, the program would build on the success of the Open Textbook Pilot which is already projected to save students an estimated $250 million since its creation in 2018.
OPEN CONNECTIONS
Conferences, jobs, and other OER-related opportunities
CALL FOR PROPOSALS: The call for proposals is open for the 2025 Open Education Conference (#OpenEd25), which will be held as a hybrid event on October 28-30 in Denver, CO and online. The theme “Eyes on the Horizon” explores a range of interesting and timely topics. Submit a virtual or in-person proposal before April 4th, 11:59 pm PT.
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: You are invited to submit a session proposal for the OpenCon Ohio 2025 free, virtual conference. The event will be held the week of May 19-22, 2025. During the week, asynchronous conversations will be held online in Discord to discuss prerecorded lightning talks. On Thursday, May 22, 2025 there will be virtual presentations, interactive conversations, and a keynote presentation delivered by Apurva Ashok, The Rebus Foundation’s Executive Director. All proposal submissions are due on March 18th, 2025
CALL FOR PAPERS: The Journal of Open Educational Resources in Higher Education (JOERHE) invites you to submit original quantitative and qualitative innovative practice articles and case studies concerning Open Pedagogy, Open Data, and analyses of current topics in Open Educational Resources within the context of Higher Education in the United States and Canada. Initial review of submissions will begin on March 31, 2025. The submission portal closes on April 30, 2025.
CALL FOR PROPOSALS: You are invited to submit chapter proposals for The Open Pedagogy Cookbook, an edited Creative Commons volume to be published by the Association of College and Research Libraries. This publication will contain lesson plans, resources, and inspiration from librarians who have successfully implemented open pedagogy at their institutions. Proposals are due on May 2, 2025.
VIRTUAL CONFERENCE: The Missouri Affordable and Open Educational Resources Conference (A&OER) planning committee invites you to the 6th annual virtual conference! The theme of this year’s conference is: What's the Blueprint? Collaborative Strategies for OER Success. The conference will be held virtually on March 6, 2025. Registration is free to all attendees, including out-of-state and international participants.
WEBINAR: The UC Davis Library’s next AggieOpen Invited Speaker Series event features Indigenous Engagement Librarian Jessie Loyer who will explore the history of Open Access and draw upon histories of caretaking in her talk, The Agreements that Allow Us to Care for Each Other. The free virtual event will be held on Zoom Tuesday, March 4, at 11:00 am PT.
HYBRID EVENT: The University of British Columbia is holding an online & in-person interactive workshop which will explore the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and OER. Topics will include AI’s potential in generating dynamic content like interactive textbooks, as well as the legal and ethical considerations of both AI and OER, such as copyright and privacy. The event is on March 7 at 1:00 PM PT.
WEBINAR: Join the OER Collective’s webinar on Thursday, March 6, at 2:00 PM AEDT to reflect on the journey of the CAUL OER Collective and its future plans. This session will highlight upcoming OER texts, grant opportunities, and feature a sneak peek into new projects, followed by a Q&A with the Collective.
WEBINAR: The University of British Columbia is also holding a webinar on the landscape of open education in Canada. The event brings together experts from across Canada to discuss the evolving open education landscape in the country. The event is on March 25 at 12:00 PM PT.
WEBINAR: The Open Education Association Development Project, a new national initiative to support collaborative action and strategic coordination on open education in the U.S., is holding an introductory webinar on March 10 at 2:00PM ET.
SURVEY: Portland State University invites you to participate in a research study on Open Education and Social Justice at Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs). The survey should take approximately 20 minutes to complete and is open until March 21, 2025.
SURVEY: The Rebus Foundation is conducting a survey to hear about how open education is supported at your institution or region. The survey takes 5-7 minutes to complete and will help the Rebus Foundation to create programs that meet your needs.
STORIES FROM THE FIELD
Quick snapshots of those making change on the ground level, and those impacted
FROM ILLINOIS: The College of DuPage in northern Illinois has been reducing textbook costs for students by investing in OER. The college has offered grants to support faculty not just seeking out OER materials but also looking to create their own. So far, over 100 faculty have worked on open education projects. And last fall, the college also launched a Zero Textbook Cost tool where students can filter or search for classes with zero textbook costs, reports DuPage librarian Lauren Kosrow. These investments have saved students over $7 million over the past five years. The next goal for the college is to offer an Associate of Arts degree path with zero textbook costs. In addition, the nearby Waubonsee Community College has expanded OER and has saved students over $1 million since 2022, according to Waubonsee professor Aaron Lawler. Read More >>
FROM KANSAS: The University of Kansas in Lawrence will host Virginia Clinton-Lisell, associate professor in educational foundations and research at the University of North Dakota and lead researcher of the Open Education Group, to deliver a public lecture about her research on open education. “We are excited to have Dr. Clinton-Lisell, a well-respected researcher in the field of open education, to speak about how open education and OER can impact teaching and learning for the Libraries Open Education Week event,” said Heather Mac Bean, KU Libraries’ Open Education Librarian. “We’re also delighted to announce this year’s Textbook Hero, someone who has championed OER creation and use in the classroom.” KU Libraries has long been a leader in the advancement of open knowledge, including open education, joining the Open Education Network in 2015, and establishing an OER Grant Initiative that has provided 44 awards to KU instructors with an estimated annual savings of more than $1.2 million for KU students. Read More >>
FROM MASSACHUSETTS: UMass Lowell, along with Framingham State University and Northern Essex Community College, is leading an OER project in Massachusetts, funded by a nearly $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The initiative aims to produce open textbooks to be used in popular freshmen and sophomore-level courses that lay the foundation for undergraduate success for students enrolled in any of the community college, state university and UMass system institutions across the commonwealth. “Transforming education to meet the needs of our students and foster their success is a hallmark of UMass Lowell,” said Julie Nash, senior vice provost for academic affairs. “The online materials developed by our faculty through this project will reduce the need for traditional textbooks, which will provide a cost savings to our students; ease the transition into college, particularly for transfer students; and streamline the classroom experience.” Read More >>
HOT OFF THE PRESS
Each edition, we highlight an interesting, new, openly-licensed resource
VIVA is pleased to announce the publication of a new OER: Community and Public Health Nursing: A Call to Action by Andrea Reed, Beth Tremblay, Chloe Gross, Felisa Smith, Gretchen Wiersma, Jamela M. Martin, Judith Rogers Fruiterman, and Roy Brown. This new OER explores the diverse roles of community and public health nurses through a social justice lens and examines key issues such as health disparities, access to care, cultural competence, and the impact of social determinants on public health outcomes.
WEIGH IN
Great reads to repost or share and interesting discussions to consider
University libraries must be ‘access brokers’, not knowledge repositories | Times Higher Education
The Aesthetics of OER, Deaf Pedagogy, and Curriculum Design Contra the “Wicked” Policy of Deaf Education | RIED-Revista Iberoamericana de Educación a Distancia
Students discuss textbook prices at Penn State University Bookstore, share alternatives | PSU Daily Collegian
Deal or no deal: Are bookstore prices too high? | The KentStater
Are textbooks a relic of the past? | The Muhlenberg Weekly
OPINION: Textbook companies only care about their profits | The Daily Nebraskan
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.