Getting Started with an OER Strategy at York University Libraries

Over the last 6-months or so, you've been hearing about open educational resources (OER) at our all-staff library meetings at York. Now that you know a little bit more about OER and how they help make university more affordable for students, it's time to talk about how we can get started with developing an OER initiative at our institution!

A really great way for us to get started is to create an internal library committee to explore how York University Libraries can work with other York departments to develop and support an OER strategy. Here are some potential projects the committee can undertake

(1) Investigating what other institutions are doing with OER:

• We'll want to conduct an environmental scan and look at what's already been done. This will help us gain a better understanding of some approaches we could take at York.

(2) Reaching out to students:

• We'll also want to talk to students, including the student unions and associations on campus. Hearing directly from students, especially in terms of how they struggle with textbook costs, will be instrumental in helping us move forward on a large-scale OER strategy.
• It will also be beneficial for us to either survey students about how much they're spending on textbooks or see if any departments at York are already collecting this data.

(3) Talking to faculty:

• In order to develop an OER strategy at York, we'll need to talk to faculty about what types of supports they need to make the switch over to using OER in their classrooms. This type of information will help us figure out how we can use our expertise in areas like finding resources, licensing, and metadata to support faculty through this process.

(4) Working with other York staff & departments:

• Our colleagues in the Teaching Commons, the Copyright Office, the Bookstore, and other units will most likely be interested in being part of an OER strategy at York. Saving students money and introducing faculty to new pedagogical approaches will definitely be of interest to a broad number of York staff.

(5) Creating resources to educate & improve discoverability:

• After we find out more about different OER models, start to develop some ideas for York's approach, and gather feedback from stakeholders, we'll also need to create some basic educational resources tailored to the needs of York's faculty and staff. This could include creating a LibGuide that explains what OER and open pedagogy are, while also providing access to curated lists of OER for specific subjects taught at York and links to OER repositories.  

So now you know a little bit more about the types of projects our internal committee will be undertaking! While there will be a lot of moving parts involved in carrying out this work, I think the work will also be interesting and engaging, as you'll get to meet and work with students, faculty, and other staff across York University. The work that you'll engage in will also help the Libraries move the issue of OER forward at our campus and set the groundwork for creating a larger strategy for the entire university. Hopefully now that you know a bit more about the work of this committee, you'll consider joining it and help us get started with creating an OER strategy that makes sense for York!

This blog post, authored by Stephanie Quail,

is  available under a CC BY 4.0 international license