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An Accidental, Systematic Attack on OER Sustainability Models

Iterating Toward Openness

Many institutions charge students a fee associated with their OER courses as a way of funding the institutions’ OER efforts. For example, Kansas State University’s Open/Alternative Textbook Initiative course fee is a $10 fee that is payed by students in courses that use OER and other free, traditionally copyrighted resources.

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Does OER Actually Improve Learning?

Edsurge

Regardless of where you stand on the debate over open educational resources, you’re probably wondering: Does OER actually improve learning outcomes? This question came up in a handful of discussions this week at the OpenEd conference in Niagara Falls, NY. That may sound familiar to those who follow the open education movement.

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Open Educational Resources Are ‘Moving Up the Adoption Ladder’ Around the World

Edsurge

Open educational resources have gone global and may help make learning more accessible, equitable and inclusive around the world. So says the new Educause Horizon report , which identifies technologies and trends that are changing higher education. These are the kinds of efforts the report describes as helping OER spread in the U.S.

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OER is Growing at Religious Colleges, But Raises Unique Challenges

Edsurge

One popular draw to open educational resources is that these openly-licensed learning materials can—and are often encouraged to—be tailored for a particular professor or course. Communications librarian Kristen Hoffman oversees much of the OER work at Seattle Pacific University, a Christian university in Washington.

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OER Cost Savings and Adoption Rates: New Methodologies, New Data, and New Results

Iterating Toward Openness

At the OpenEd Conference in 2013, Nicole Allen and I challenged the OER community to save students one billion dollars. The overall average price for “OER Only” (Open Educational Resources in all formats, including new print, used print, rental, loose-leaf, and digital) is $10.69. The adoption rate of OER is 6.3%.

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Is Open Content Enough? Where OER Advocates Say the Movement Must Go Next

Edsurge

In response, open educational materials, or OER, have emerged as an alternative to expensive textbooks that disproportionately affect low-income students. But as more open materials become accessible, advocates for open education still see room for improvement. What open education is saying though, is “yes, and.”

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?A Playbook to Go Open: 5 Steps to Adopting OER

Edsurge

Public schools now provide at least one computer for every five students and spend more than $3 billion per year on digital content, according to Education Week. Now, a seemingly limitless amount of robust digital content is available for educators to tailor content to individual students.

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