Open Education Resources

Benefits and Challenges

Key TermsOpen Education Resource (OER): free and openly licensed education materials for teaching and learning

Creative Commons: a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools

BENEFITSCost

learning enhancementReuse of materials

Social Responsibility Update and change

Cost Most OERs are free or low cost;

This is a huge benefit to ALL students and educators

Learning Enhancement OERs offer lots of choice; educators can use bits and pieces from many sources

To put together an overall higher quality lesson to enhance learning overall.

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Reuse materials OERs make the guidelines and restrictions if any for reusing material

simple and easy to understand.

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Social Responsibility

We have a social responsibility in a country that has more overall resources to share more with other less developed countries.

Easy to Change Update Revise Peer Edit

Digital format allows for updating, revising and editing with less time and expense; we can have immediate access to updated material.

CHALLENGESLack of UnderstandingNon revocable license

Sustainability Quality AssuranceTechnology Issues

Lack Of Understand

OERs are a recent development. Changing the mindset of educators and students to shift away from traditional textbooks can be difficult.

Non Revocable License

Once someone lists their work as an OER using creative commons licensing, they cannot change their mind regardless of what someone might use it for.

Sustainability Some OERs are backed by large universities but those that are not run the risk of

depleting funding. Maintaining the resources can be difficult and expensive.

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Quality Assurance Textbooks go through several stages of editing; this is not required for OER

submission thus making the reliability and accuracy of some work questionable.

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Technology Issues OER is completely dependent on technology so if connection is lost or technology

is not available, the value of OERs is completely lost.

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In the end….Benefits outweigh the challenges

OERs should be pursued in academic circles.