Benefits and challenges of using OER

1. Open Educational
Resources
by Lindsey Stixrud
Benefits & Challenges of

2. Benefits
• Reduces costs to students
• Encourages active engagement
• Increases currency of materials
• Allows customization
• Permits continual access

3. Reduces Costs
Textbook costs have risen steadily.
“The rising costs of postsecondary education present challenges to
maintaining college affordability. Textbooks are an important factor students
need to consider when calculating the overall cost of attending college. ”
"College Textbooks: Students Have Greater Access to Textbook Information" by U.S. Government Accountability Office, GAO-13-368 is in the Public
Domain
Most OER resources are low-cost or free, which helps alleviate this problem.
The low costs of OER also make learning more available to the general public.

4. Encourages Active
Engagement
• Because many OER are
adaptable, students can
use them to create their
own projects.
• Instructors can
incorporate a variety of
sources for differing
perspectives. "Active Learning Space 333"
by queensu is licensed under CC BY-
NC-ND 2.0.

5. Currency
• It can take several years to
publish a textbook.
• Most OER web textbooks can
be improved or updated
quickly, which is especially
important in STEM fields.
"A Touch of Science" by Mars P. is licensed under CC BY
2.0

6. Customization
Instructors can build their own
courses using a variety of OER.
Instructors can modify and
adapt materials as needed.

7. Continual
Access
• Students have access to
most course materials
indefinitely should they
need to review the
information.

8. Challenges
• Quality
• Sustainability
• Copyright Concerns
• Accessibility
• No central database

9. Quality
• While many OER
sources are in curated
collections or peer
reviewed, not all are.
• OER that are open for
direct editing by users
may have inaccuracies.

10. Sustainability
• Institutions and organizations have
to foot the cost of maintenance and
management of OER collections
• The costs of producing OER
textbooks must come from funds,
grants, and institutions.
Funds come from
• Open textbook projects
• Government
• Philanthropic organizations
• Professional societies
• Institutions
Self-Publishing Guide by Lauri M. Aesoph is
licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution
4.0 International License, except where
otherwise noted.

11. Copyright
Concerns
Since OER sometimes
incorporate copyrighted
information, they need to
be checked carefully
before they are re-mixed
or reused.
"Logo Creative Commons" by Grupo THM,
Tecnologías Horticultura Mediterránea is
licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

12. Accessibility
Use of English as primary language of delivery may limit the use of
OER
. "Open educational resources" by Wikipedia is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
Those OER designated “No Derivative” can not be translated and
used.
"The OER are in the wrong language. Can I translate them?" by Wikipedia is licensed under CC BY 4.0

13. No Central
Database
• While there are many excellent
OER collections, there is no one
place to find them.
• Collections are managed
differently, which makes it more
difficult to search for and cite
them.