By Jaymes Grace
Information on Open Educational Resources with Billy Coghill, one of Chelsea James’ OER interns from The University of Arizona studying as a graduate student in the School of Information. Video by Billy Coghill.
Open educational resources, or OER, is why many students no longer pay for textbooks, or do they? The Pima Post heard from Chelsea James, Pima’s Open Educational Resources (OER) & Course Materials Director. James asked the Post to share with Pima students a little information and understanding around OER materials.
According to AI, Open Educational Resources have been around since the early 1970s, with the term “open educational resource” coined in 2002 by UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
According to Wikipedia, “Open educational resources are teaching, learning and research materials intentionally created and licensed to be free for the end user to own, share and in most cases, modify. The term “OER” describes publicly accessible materials and resources for any user to use, remix, improve and redistribute under some licenses.These are designed to reduce accessibility barriers by implementing best practices in teaching and to be adapted for local unique contexts.”
Dr Elliot Mead, Writing Faculty & Reading Department Head for Pima Community College shared their experience with OER materials. Dr Mead currently writes all of the material used in their classes.
“I noticed that as a teacher, the textbooks that I was bringing into my writing classrooms and my literature classrooms and things like the materials that were in them weren’t always relevant. We were paying a lot of money for books that we would use a third of,” Mead said. “And I just realized that at the dawn of the internet, everything was available—why not see what we could do in a classroom setting to make a useful text—one that we used almost everything out of, one that wasn’t a $100- $200 for my students to buy. That would be more reflective of their experiences and interests than the kind of generic textbook that, you know, was sent to us from Norton.”
“I just really got involved once OER kind of became more official, and there were more procedures and opportunities to develop material and to share it with other folks,” Mead said. “I was pleased I was able to get a grant through Pima Community College to develop a couple of courses using all OER. So I developed my writing courses, one literature course. Which was really cool, we’d take a whole LIT 261 class, and everything is online, all the short stories, novels, that kind of thing.”
What we have now with OER are more relevant educational materials with no cost. That is a definite win for Pima students. But students should be aware that even if they don’t have to go and purchase a book from the bookstore, they may still be paying for the book with associated fees.
According to James, when a course says under materials, no cost, then there is no fee. But if it directs you to view materials, then there is a cost.