Open Education Resources (OER) are textbooks, learning objects, and other educational materials which are OPEN - that is, they are free to use, have few or no access restrictions, and most can be freely remixed, customized, and adapted. Many OER have a Creative Commons license or are in the public domain.

In addition to support from the eLearning and Emerging Technologies team, GVSU's University Libraries provides an Open Educational Resources site that includes a variety of helpful information.

eLearning and Emerging Technologies provides faculty with support to:

• Incorporate OER to make courses more flexible and effective
• Explore learning object repositories and open textbook materials to discover effective OER
• Learn tools and technologies for creating customized instructional materials with OER
• Leverage OER in teaching by applying quality instructional design
• Integrate OER into Blackboard courses, assignments, and assessments

Why adopt OER?

Whether you realize it or not you are probably already an OER creator and curator. Every time you create, search, and incorporate an online video, custom presentation or other instructional resource into your course you are providing your students with an alternative to the high cost of purchased textbooks and yourself, the flexibility to deliver unique and specialized content. 

For example, Charlene Beckman, professor of mathematics at GVSU, took advantage of the Digital Studio's video production expertise to create a series of video tutorials for the Regional Math and Science Center's "Math Games & Activities" resource site.

Why should YOU adopt OER? Open Educational Resources have many benefits, such as:

• Saving students money and supporting affordable education
• Improving students access to course content and break down barriers to knowledge
• Enabling faculty to adapt, revise, customize, and reuse instructional content
• Providing flexible and innovative pedagogical applications of digital materials

Create your own OER!

In the Digital Studio, faculty and staff can work with our team of digital media and content creation specialists to develop and create their own Open Educational Resources. Utilizing a variety of software and hardware tools, the studio can provide support for recording and editing audio, video and wide range of interactive content.

Not sure which tool is right for you or what's available? Our team of media specialists can aid in the design, production and deployment of your custom tutorial, learning object or Lightboard video from start - to - finish.

Need Inspiration?

Check out over 30 examples of Digital Studio projects highlighting innovative content delivery - from interactive multimedia to 360 degree video to augmented reality and more!

Start your OER Journey

To learn more about the services that are available or to discuss your OER project, please contact Justin Melick, Hunter Bridwell or Vince St. Germain in the eLearning and Emerging Technologies Digital Studio at (616) 331-2035.