In Summer 2015 KU joined a growing coalition of institutions dedicated to addressing the rising costs of textbooks through open educational resources by joining the Open Textbook Network, which hosts the Open Textbook Library, a curated collection of over 400 open textbooks ready for use in the classroom. As a member of OTN, KU Libraries provides data regarding costs of texts in the pursuit of a degree programs at KU, and hosts workshops and training to raise awareness and support open textbook adoptions.
Graduate Engagement Librarian Carmen Orth-Alfie served on the OTN Steering Committee in 2016/2017.
Scholarly Communication Librarian Josh Bolick serves as a Presenter for the OTN, traveling to other member institutions to provide training, workshops, and consultation on building OER initiatives.
During Open Access Week 2015, we asked students a simple question: How are you impacted by expensive textbooks? Over the course of 3 days we gathered over 75 comments from students that provide a poignant snapshot of student experiences related to high cost of texts.
The event was featured as part of a local news story "Students collaborate with KU Libraries to sound off about the high cost of textbooks". See video below:
The goal of the KU OER Grant Initiative is to support the implementation of open educational resources (OER) by KU faculty/instructors and encourage their use at KU to positively impact students. Faculty/instructors may apply for funding to implement OER in their courses.
Individuals, teams, and departments/programs may submit proposals to:
Adopt an existing open textbook (or other educational resource); $1,000
Adapt existing open educational resources to your instructional needs; up to $2,500
Create an open educational resource where none currently exist; up to $5,000; contact us prior to submitting a proposal for a Create grant.
More information and application procedures are available at https://openaccess.ku.edu/grant.
As of December 2017, 10 projects are in various stages of execution, with total funding committed approximately $33,000, and an estimated per semester of use cumulative savings to students of $88,000 with potential for much greater savings.
The Open Educational Resources Initiative at KU is a collaborative effort of members of the Shulenburger Office of Scholarly Communication & Copyright and other members of Research and Learning Division in Watson Library at KU. Please send questions and comments to Josh Bolick, Scholarly Communication Librarian at jbolick@ku.edu.
The School of Languages, Literatures & Cultures has partnered with the Ermal Garinger Academic Resource Center to employ state-of-the art technologies in the production of OER by SLLC faculty at KU. The University of Kansas makes available and permanently curates these resources to promote the study of languages and cultures in addition to providing face-to-face and online language instruction. Many of these materials are produced as Open Educational Resources (OER) and made available to the public through KU ScholarWorks at no charge under Creative Commons licensing. More information about these materials is available on the KU SLLC OER site.