Open and Editable: Exploring Library Engagement in OER Adoption, Adaptation and Authoring

 In her article, "Open and Editable: Exploring Library Engagement in Open Educational Resource Adoption, Adaptation and Authoring, author Anita Walz talks about the nature of OER's are and how librarians can adopt and use them for low cost opportunities especially in university and research libraries. Libraries are increasingly asked to do more with less. A common misconception about OER is that since they are free-- they must not be quality materials another is the ability to locate relevant OER's by faculty members. There are many universities including San Jose State, that are using OER's to lower the cost for students buying books.

"Locally, the Virginia Community College System has been very active incentivizing development of free and openly licensed materials for nearly 70 courses. A notable example is Tidewater Community College’s “Z Degree,” which replaces textbooks with OER, resulting in a zero textbook cost degree. While project organizers did not initially partner with the library in development of the Z Degree, this author is pleased to see that the library is now involved, per their detailed OER Research Guide (Walz, 2015)."

 Author Walz delves into why individuals would forego future royalties in order to provide a free service to the public. Listed below are a few examples and rationale.

"A faculty member or teacher employed in an educational institution may choose to openly license and disseminate works for original created works via various repositories or websites. Students and teachers benefit by increased access and ease of making derivatives.

Tesla Motors indicated that they would not enforce their patents for electric car technology in order to spur dissemination and development of electric car technology and production.

The Hewlett Foundation funded the 2001 startup of the MIT OpenCourseWare project, a courseware sharing initiative in line with MIT’s mission “to advance knowledge and educate students (Walz, 2015)."

All of these instances really speak to serving the public through expanded opportunities for learning, business growth and affordability. This was a very inspirational article!! It speaks to the forward thinking and educational desires of company owners, librarians and educators.

Reference:
Walz, A. R. (2015). Open and Editable: Exploring Library Engagement in Open Educational Resource Adoption, Adaptation and Authoring. Virginia Libraries, 61(1), 23-31