Textbook Alternatives & Open Educational Resources (OER)

A large scale study at the University of Georgia that showed switching from commercial textbooks to OER resources improved students' grades.

A study of over 22,000 students found that 66.5% of students did not purchase the required textbook / course materials solely due to cost.

Provides information and examples of library support for open educational resources (OER) development and distribution.

"helping to improve teaching and learning through digital materials"

"The OpenCourseWare Consortium is a collaboration of higher education institutions and associated organizations from around the world creating a broad and deep body of open educational content using a shared model."

"Open source methodologies have a lot to offer in the world of education. This is a forum for discussing how."

"Our mission is to expand access to education by promoting awareness and adoption of Open Educational Resources (OER). Over 100 colleges are members of our consortium and many more participate in our activities and use the resources posted here."

"This review provides a summary of all known empirical research on the impacts of OER adoption (including our own). The version originally published here in February 2015 was abstracted from of an article submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal."

This site suggests methods and offers templates for approaching a search for OERs.