Creating a College-wide OER

ProgramJane Rosecrans, PhD

Coordinator, Reynolds OER Initiative

Reynolds OER Initiative Timeline

• June 2014: With the blessing of college administration, faculty developed a program proposal and timeline

• July 2014: “Call for Participants” emailed college-wide

• August 2014: OER Introductory Workshop

• Fall 2014: 11 Faculty met regularly and developed OER materials for their assigned courses

OER Initiative Timeline (continued)

• Spring 2015: OER sections for 11 courses piloted

• May 2015: Lumen Learning Workshop

• Summer 2015: faculty will revise OER sections based on spring pilot experiences and Lumen workshop

• Fall 2015: OER program advertised for 11 courses (thus far, there are 26 OER sections mostly among English faculty)

OER Courses

• ENG 111, 112 (College Composition I and II)

• ENG 242, 243 (2nd half of American literature; 1st half of British literature

• HIS 121, 121 (United States History I and II)

• MTH 163 (Precalculus)

• BIO 101, 102 (Biology I and II)

• PSY 200 (Principles of Psychology)

• SDV 100 (College Success Skills)

OER Materials

• OER is mapped to Course Outcomes

• Most courses are using open textbooks from Openstax

• English composition faculty are using materials from several open sites as well as other materials

• Literature faculty have located literary works from a variety of places – links to online sources as well as PDF files of works in the public domain

Students Results

• Students in the 11 Spring 2015 pilot courses saved over $34,000

• Students in 26 OER sections will save almost $100,000

• Students are currently completing a survey on the use of OER (results available May 4th)

• What are students doing with the money they are saving? Paying for another course, paying bills, buying food, saving up for VCU

Quality Assurance

• All four deans have been contacted to identify courses for which they would like to develop OER sections

• All OER sections must be reported to me

• Any faculty member outside of the pilots intending to use OER in the fall is required to attend May Lumen Workshop

• English Department has developed an OER adoption form to identify which sections of English courses will not be using a textbook

OER Policies and Procedures

• Summer 2015 will be spent developing OER policies and procedures based on those developed by Tidewater Community College as part of their Z Degree

• Pathways Course: faculty interested in teaching with OER will be required to complete this 5-week program

• Pathways Train the Trainers to take place this summer for two college faculty: Me and Miles McCrimmon, director of the ACA, whose faculty are also using OER

Effects of OER on Teaching

• Allows for creative expression

• Learning artifacts can be better targeted

• Abundant material from which to cull

• Developing the course can be more time consuming in the beginning

• Enables professional collaboration

• Students need strategies for reading Web-based text

• Free/open technology options promote active learning

Effects of OER on Learning

• “I enjoy a class where a book is not needed because . . . a teacher is able to also keep information current and is able to change it around to meet each classes’ needs. Each class has different people with different learning styles and interests.” ~ Ashley Irwin

• “Virtual learning is cost efficient versus having a physical text in front of me. Paper is not wasted and articles on the computer are free! Discussion boards & reader’s responses work perfectly as a learning tool. Following a book can be tedious!” ~ Melissa Woodhouse

• “Using the web is far easier and more helpful to learning the subject. Having items on the web allows us to locate information directly without having to go through numerous pages of a text book. This setup is also something that will help students shift into the workplace. Having learned how to access and cypher through resources on the web in this type of class, students will be invaluable to their employers.” – Ryan McNamara

Lessons Learned

• No matter what you do to prepare, the first year will always be a learning experience for everyone involved

• College-wide information meetings educate the college about what OER is and isn’t

• Set up a workshop with experts (Lumen Learning) to help define terms and introduce faculty to the process of developing OER as early in the process as possible

• Find the right faculty

• Set up policies and procedures

• It Takes a Campus: keep the lines of college-wide communication open

• Don’t reinvent the wheel: use the efforts and materials of those of us who are already doing this to help you