Open Educational Resources

What is OER?

Open educational resources (OER) “are teaching, learning and research materials in any medium – digital or otherwise – that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.”¹ That is, OER include built in permission to retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute the material.

In an effort to exhibit the need for OER at institutions across the state of Kansas, the Kansas Board of Regents Student Advisory Committee conducted a survey in 2019 to demonstrate the burden of textbook costs on students at Regent Institutions. They found that 48 percent of 6,474 regent institutions’ students indicated they did not purchase or rent a required textbook in the spring semester. Seventeen percent said they did not purchase or rent three or more required textbooks.¹ By not purchasing textbooks, students could be at a disadvantage, which could hinder their success in a course. With open/alternative educational resources, all students get equal and immediate access to educational materials.²

Why OER?

Hear Fort Hays State University Student Body President, Mark Faber give an address to the February 2022 Kansas OER Summit attendees about how OER impacts students. Click here to listen to his speech. 

Upcoming Trainings/Events

OER Legislative Showcase- Thursday, March 23  8:30-3:00pm  Capitol Rotunda

Come learn all about OER and see our institutions in action in the capitol rotunda! Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if you'd like to represent your institution and participate!

2023 Spring OER Discipline Roundtables (visit the OER Roundtables webpage)

OER Beyond the Basics: Faculty Workshops (promotional flyer-pdf) 

Finding, Evaluating & Adopting OER  Thursday, Feb 23  2:00 pm

Finding the right OER for your courses can be daunting and this workshop will review the best places to begin your search for OER textbooks, assignments, lectures and other materials. We will also cover how to evaluate OER to make sure it's a good fit for your students and institution. Since planning time is precious, participants will be encouraged to practice searching and evaluating during the workshop to make the best use of their time.  

Finding Evaluating & Adopting OER Workshop Recording

Presentation Slides

Adapting OER   Tuesday, March 7  2:00 pm

You picked out an OER or two that you want to use in class. They need some changes or need to be combined. Now what? This workshop will lead you through the following steps to adapting your OERs. We will start by determining the licensing of your OERs and then look at where to edit and provide access to your adapted OER. Finally, we will look at correctly attributing the original OERs and how to create your own Creative Commons license for your new textbook. Throughout the workshop, guiding questions will help you make decisions efficiently and effectively. 

Adapting OER Workshop Recording

Presentation Slides & Presentation Sources

Accessibility & OER  Thursday, April 6  2:00 pm

Now that you have found an OER to use in your class and adapted it to your needs, how can you further adapt it to make it accessible for all.  This workshop will cover the basics of the why and how of accessibility and universal design.  Then, we will dive deeper into enabling user agency to enhance the user experience (UX).  Some topics include accessibility tools, scalability, anchored content, and keyboard navigation. 

Accessibility & OER Workshop Recording

Presentation Slides

Statewide OER Steering Committee

To encourage OER use across public institutions in the state of Kansas, the OER Steering Committee was developed and is made up of representatives across Kansas public institutions who are interested in OER on their campuses. The group convenes once a month to discuss statewide initiatives, including collaborative events, grant applications, system participation in regional and national OER organizations, OER platforms, and best practices. If your institution does not have a representative on the OER Steering Committee and you would like to add someone, email Tara Lebar, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

	OER & Estimating Student Savings Developed in January 2022, the OER Steering Committee recommendation outlines a formula for estimating savings resulting from OER use in KBOR System institutions.  While it's difficult, if not impossible to accurately capture savings due to a variety of factors, the Steering Committee members believe that Kansas System institutions benefit from a common method to estimate savings, when appropriate and possible.  This paper outlines our recommendations, sites other research and policies around estimating cost savings, and explains the rationale behind developing this formula.
	2022 Open Education Initiatives in Kansas Higher Education Report (pdf) January 2021, the OER Steering Committee sent out the first survey to gather information on how Open Education Resources (OER) are currently being implemented across the public higher education institutions in Kansas.  The survey was repeated in the spring of 2022. This is the second report summarizing the OER initiatives across our system.  For more information about this survey, report or KBOR system initiatives click here
	The Kansas Board of Regents Open Educational (OER) Steering Committee Action Plan (pdf) was developed as a result of the 2019 student-focused survey conducted by the Kansas Board of Regents Student Advisory Committee and collaborative discussion among members of the OER Steering Committee. The plan explains what OER are as well as the statewide priorities.
	The Textbook Affordability Survey 2019 Results & Report (pdf) was conducted by the 2018-2019 Student Advisory Committee to provide concrete data behind the burden of textbook costs that students attending our universities are facing.

2023-24 Members of the Open Educational Resources Steering Committee

System Memberships & Partnerships

Midwestern Higher Education Compact (MHEC)

  The Midwestern Higher Education Compact (MHEC) has promoted and facilitated the implementation of Open Educational Resources (OER) at a regional level since 2018 when twelve OER state action teams were created. From these initiatives, the Kansas OER Steering Committee began, and they continue to support our work through grant funding, research, regional raining and sponsorship of our Kansas OER Summit.

Open Education Network (OEN)

In 2020, the Kansas Board of Regents joined the Open Education Network (OEN) as a consortial member. 

A diverse community of higher education institutions, the Open Education Network promotes access, affordability, and student success through the use of open textbooks.

Driving OER Sustainability for Student Success (DOERS3)

The Kansas Board of Regents is part of the Driving OER Sustainability for Student Success (DOERS3) Collaborative. Open to public higher education systems and statewide/provincewide organizations, DOERS3 and its members support large-scale OER initiatives and are committed to advancing innovation in OER. Member organizations aim to achieve equity and student success at scale by realizing the promise of high-quality, accessible, and sustainable OER implementations.

References

¹ Kansas Board of Regents Student Advisory Committee Textbook Affordability Survey: 2019 Results & Report
² https://opencontent.org/definition/

OER logo credit: Barton Community College