Why OER?

The worldwide OER movement is rooted in the human right to access high-quality education. This shift in educational practice is not just about cost savings and easy access to openly licensed content; it’s about participation and co-creation. Open Educational Resources (OER) offer opportunities for systemic change in teaching and learning content through engaging educators in new participatory processes and effective technologies for engaging with learning.

Using OER can save lots of money for students, and it gives instructors more control over the content they present in class. How often have you assigned (or been assigned) a textbook in which only a small percentage of the content is needed? Often, textbooks are designed to cover the widest array of content possible in order to meet the needs of the largest possible market. So even if you only need chapters 1, 3, 4, 6 and 11 in your class, students must purchase the whole book. Likewise, you may have content from a variety of sources you wish to compile in one reader for efficiency and cost benefit.

One beauty of OER is that it encourages sharing of educational resources and moves away from the publish-for-profit model of textbook publishing. Every day, the number and variety of free, high quality educational resources grows. Would it be nice to know all of your students have the materials on the first day of class? No waiting for that online retailer to mail the book or for the bookstore to get restocked! Instructors and staff tell us stories of sharing their personal copies of texts with numerous student, of students sharing one textbook, and other illegal methods of sharing textbooks that we won’t mention here. According to the Florida Virtual Campus 2016 Student Textbook and Course Materials Survey:

• 66.6% of respondents never bought the textbook
• 47.6% took fewer courses because of textbook costs
• 45.5% chose not to register for a course because of the textbook cost
• 46.8% dropped or withdrew from a course because of the cost of the book

IDAP (Interactive Digital Access Program)

It is worth mentioning IDAP here, which is an initiative by the textbook industry to better meet the needs of textbook consumers. Interactive digital course materials are available at the lowest publisher price (negotiated by the bookstore).  Prices vary depending on course materials chosen by instructors, but will be lower than what is listed on the publisher's website. IDAP materials are integrated into the UH Laulima system and are made available one week prior to the start of class, and last until the end of the term. IDAP rental charges are added to students' MYUH accounts, but students can decide to opt out.  If a student opts out before the established deadline (ex. Spring 2018 deadline was January 29), the IDAP rental charges are refunded to the student's MyUH account. Learn more about IDAP, and read through Leeward CC's OER Committee's OER vs. IDAP vs. Cengage chart.