What are Open Educational Resources (OER)?

Open Educational Resources are educational materials and resources offered freely and openly for anyone to use and under various licenses to re-mix, improve and redistribute. They include:

• Content - textbooks, full courses, content modules, learning objects, collections, and journals.
• Tools - software to support the use, creation, delivery, and modification of open learning content including searching and organization of content, learning management systems, development tools, and online learning communities.
• Implementation resources - intellectual property licenses to promote open publishing of materials, design-principles, and localization of content.

Why OER?

OER is a relatively new movement in education to address issues of affordability, distributed authorship, fair use and copyright. OER provides an alternative to the rising costs of textbooks, and an opportunity to try new ways of teaching and learning, many of which are more collaborative and participatory.

Some material for this LibGuide was re-used and adapted from two other excellent resources:

University Massachusetts Amherst Library's Open Educational Resources LibGuide by Marilyn Billings

Portland Community College Library's OER - Open Education Resources LibGuide by Jen Klaudinyi