Recap: What COVID-19 Taught Us About Affordable Course Materials

As part of its third annual OhioLINK Membership Summit, OhioLINK recently hosted the “What COVID-19 Taught Us About Affordable Course Materials” panel, which discussed lessons learned about using affordable course materials in the rapid transition to online learning during the pandemic.

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“Faculty would like to see some kind of financial incentive for their extra efforts, and it shows how valuable their work is in supporting our students,” said Lindsey Mason, director of faculty services, Ohio Dominican University. “So, we started brainstorming a solution to both the time and money issues. We came up with a one-day workshop hosted by both librarians and instructional designers. We learned that this time issue could be greatly mitigated by having that dedicated day with active support throughout the day. And then for the financial incentives, we were approved to use CARES Act funding to provide stipends that we’ll be paying our faculty.”

While discussing her experience with OER resources in the classroom before and during the pandemic, Anna Davis, associate professor and mathematics department head for Ohio Dominican University, noted how these resources helped her introductory statistics students stay successful, even with having to switch testing and homework to an online format.

“After examining the data for the first half of this semester between four sections pre-pandemic and three sections during the pandemic, what we found is that there was no significant difference in student averages,” Davis said.

Read the Complete Recap (approx. 900 words)