Adopting OER - SCALE - Adopt & Create OER - PASCAL LibGuides at PASCAL

Why Adopt OER?

OER are openly licensed so they can be revised and customized, allowing instructors to tailor course materials to their course and specific learning objectives.
instructors can directly reduce the cost of education for their students by adopting OER or other affordable course materials.
Students will benefit from day one access to course materials, eliminating delays in learning and the need for catch-up.

Find the right course materials

OER repositories are a good place to begin your search. Many open textbooks are peer reviewed which can help narrow your search. Our guide to Finding Open & Affordable Materials provides links to general OER collections and subject specific OERs.

Your campus librarians can also help you find relevant OER or library-licensed materials that are no-cost to students and available on day one of class.

Review and evaluate

Open course materials should be evaluated, just as traditional materials would be, to ensure they meet your criteria and are the right fit for your course. While you may have your own evaluation guidelines for course materials, there are many available tools and rubrics for evaluating open textbooks that can help as you review materials:

Found an OER that almost fits your needs? Adapt it!

Because they are openly licensed, OER can be adapted and customized, giving instructors the freedom to tailor course materials to align with specific course objectives. Content can be easily and continuously updated to reflect historical updates, scientific and technical advances, or perspectives in a discipline or technical field.

The resources below can help you with adapting OER. Your campus librarians or instructional designers may also be able to offer guidance on adapting materials to your course.

Adaptation Guide
The Adaptation Guide is a practical reference about how to customize — or adapt — an open textbook so that it better fits your needs in the classroom and elsewhere.
Modifying an Open Textbook: What You Need to Know
This is a five-step guide for faculty, and those who support faculty, who want to modify an open textbook. Step-by-step instructions for importing and editing common open textbook file and platform types are included.

Additional resources for successful adoption of open course materials:

Adopting Open Educational Resources in the Classroom
A resource for instructors on adopting, repurposing, and utilizing openly licensed educational resources. This course introduces laws influencing content use, reuse, and distribution and guides faculty through activities including finding openly licensed content, adapting or “remixing” materials, and publishing openly licensed material.
Adoption Guide, 2nd ed.
An updated and expanded version of the Adoption Guide created by BCcampus Open Education.
Five Steps to OER Adoption
Guide from Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER)
How to Use Open Educational Resources: a self-paced workshop
This course from Open Washington, “walks you through techniques to incorporate Open Educational Resources (OER) into your teaching practice. The course will cover the fundamental aspects of OER including open licensing and public domain. It focuses on providing practical guidance in locating and applying openly available resources."
The OER Starter Kit by Abbey K. Elder
Provides instructors with an introduction to the use and creation of open educational resources (OER). [Version 1.1. Revised September 5th, 2019.]

Still have questions about OER? Check out our FAQs.