OpenOKState Saves Oklahoma State University (OSU) Students $500,000

From Oklahoma St. University:

Students at Oklahoma State University have collectively saved more than $500,000 through the OpenOKState Open Educational Resources program. 

Open Educational Resources (OER) are instructional materials intentionally created to be free to students. These materials are licensed by authors to permit and encourage distribution, modification and retention. The OpenOKState OER program supports collaboration and innovation among OSU faculty, staff and students to increase access to meaningful resources. 

Kathy Essmiller, OER librarian, has many goals in mind for the OpenOKState program, but foremost is to make sure the student body knows these resources are available to them. 

“Faculty and administrators care about the students and want to increase access to opportunities across the board,” Essmiller said. “Students need to know they can speak up if they want to see more of these resources implemented in their classes.”

The library offers training, stipends and other assistance to OSU faculty and instructors interested in incorporating OER into their courses. At least 16 course modifications are completed or underway with support from OpenOKState programs. Beginning in spring 2022, students will be able to filter the OSU course catalog to search for classes using OER. 

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OpenOKState was created by the OSU Libraries in response to the impact high-cost commercial textbooks have on the personal lives and academic progress of university students. More information about the OpenOKState program can be found at info.library.okstate.edu/open.

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