Open Educational Resources

There are many different types of repositories that house Open Educational Resources, and this page is designed as a guide to these different collections.  This is by no means a definitive list, but is a good sampling of the types of resources and collections of OER that exist.  Many of the major collections are discussed here, and new resources will be added frequently.

What you can find here:

• Faculty Select: Through a single interface, faculty can search and access quality open textbooks, Open Educational Resources (OER), and request access to unrestricted library e-books from top academic publishers. 
• OpenTextbook repositories: Collections of textbooks designed to be open for faculty to reuse - remix - redistribute in courses for free. 
• The major Open Educational Resource repositories:  These are collections of open materials covering all of the educational spectrum.  There are materials covering all educational disciplines.  
• OpenCourseWare repositories: These are collections of materials submitted by faculty members at universities that are part of the OCW movement.  

Also, do not forget about Open Access Resources. Open Access Resources, or OARs, refer to freely available, digital, information. The primary difference between OER and OAR is that OER typically can be adapted, edited, and remixed. In other words, if you as the Subject Matter Expert want to adopt an OER textbook, you do not have to adopt the textbook precisely as is. You can add content, remove content, and adapt the text to fit your needs as long as you provide attribution. Additionally, open access scholarly literature is freely available online like OER but, like all intellectual property, it still carries restrictive copyright and licensing barriers, and may not permit adapting or remixing.

For more information on open access, please see the library’s Open Access Resources Guide.