Finding Funding and Assessing the Level of Effort: Moving Your Course Materials to Zero-Cost Open Educational Resources

Term: Fall 2025

Date: December 3rd, 2025

Time: 11:00 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.

Location: Online Only

Instructors: Anita Walz

Presented By: University Libraries (LIB)

Description:

Identify potential funding sources, support, and explore workload expectations of different processes for creating and sharing Open Educational Resources (OER). OER are learning resources in nearly any format which are licensed for free adaptation and sharing. Virginia Tech has invested in various tools, platforms, and support methods to enable faculty and GTAs to find, adapt, vet, and share OER in a wide variety of formats. These have included course readers, interactive open textbooks, free-free Canvas-integrated homework software replacements, and more. Faculty efforts in conjunction with the University Libraries’ Open Education Initiative have resulted in student course material savings in excess of $4 million since program inception. This session presents a step-by-step workflows, decision-tree, and resource guide for faculty exploring or interested in curating or combining existing openly-licensed materials in a variety of platforms for a variety of instructional purposes, creating new OER, or simply exploring what such processes might look like. We believe that such practices greatly and directly benefit students in the areas of access and affordability, and improved instructional integration between course learning objectives, teaching practices, course content, and assessment, leading to a more engaged student experience and greater potential for improved student academic performance and completion.