Item Detail
-
University of North Alabama
-
Located in Florence, AL
Suburban
Public -
6196
-
1454
-
Governing/managing body: Library
Program partners
• EdTech
Funding
• Provost office -
Campus OER working group
• EdTech
• OER & scholarly communications librarian
• Tenured faculty
• Non-tenured faculty
• Student Engagement (deals with food pantry and food • insecurity)
• SGA Senator
Campus survey
OER Grant (stipend) program
Workshops/training
Publishing - Pressbooks
Leveraging library resources -
University administrative support has been key to the success of OER. Primarily the provost “who is our biggest champion, decided we needed to have a comprehensive OER program.” In conjunction with the state-wide efforts from the “Alabama Commission on Higher Education and the Alabama Community College System decided they wanted to have sort of a statewide OER program. And they were scaffolding it off of Affordable Learning Georgia.” The provost was instrumental in changing the faculty contracts to “include OER as an example of scholarship.” The provost also worked to insert a new aspiration into the strategic plan ratified in 2019 “that 50% of all of our course offerings will have some form of OER in them.” Around the same time the student government passed a resolution for OER.
Any faculty who wants to apply for an OER grant “had to take the OER course that I built in Canvas, and I built it using open Washington and Affordable Learning George's online courses.” This ensured that participants understood not only the grant requirements but also what OER is and what it entails to adopt, adapt or create OERs. Two of the first worked on converting textbooks that are out of print leveraging fair use and public domain content. While “it's not like traditional OER because we are leveraging fair use, it is textbook affordability and OER for students because it's completely free.” Other faculty are publishing textbooks to fill gaps they see in the profession. In addition, library resources are leveraged to bring content to students without a cost.