Open Textbooks and Open Educational Resources (OERs)

Amid the many changes and evolving political dynamics within today’s education landscape, open educational resources (OER) serve as foundational tools that promote and encourage academic freedom, support affordability, and expand access for all learners. As you prepare for your upcoming courses and align your learning materials to your course objectives, I encourage you to consider how implementing OER can support your course needs: 

• Freedom of Choice: With OER, you're free to choose and integrate resources across platforms without being tied to proprietary systems. This flexibility supports innovation and customization aligned precisely with your teaching goals.
• Accessibility for All Students: While digital accessibility can pose challenges for any educational resource, OER offer unparalleled adaptability, enabling you to customize content to accommodate students with disabilities and diverse learning preferences. This includes affordable print options.
• Continual Learning: Students benefit from lifelong access to OER materials, without the constraints of subscription fees or access codes, supporting ongoing educational and professional growth.
• Customizable: OER empower educators to tailor educational content specifically to their teaching objectives, enhancing student engagement through relevant experiences that traditional publisher content may not always match.
• Interactive: OER provide a platform for innovative teaching practices, including open pedagogy, empowering students as active creators of knowledge through collaborative assignments and real-world applications.

These benefits have inspired a broad community of open education advocates—many of whom are faculty like us—across the U.S. and around the world who share values and strive to make education more accessible and reflective of the learners they serve.  Many tools and support networks are openly available to empower your teaching and help you navigate the changing educational landscape with confidence and flexibility. For help finding open educational resources please email jennifer.beamer@csusb.edu or reach out to your Subject Liaison.

This guide by Jennifer Beamer is adapted from the excellent resources at Portland Community College, Virginia Tech, and UMass Amherst Libraries. The content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License originally created by Abbey Elder, librarian and OER Advocate at Iowa State University Library, inspired by this guide.